Revelations and Revenge
by Velkan The Impaler
Summary: Danny's parents catch him transforming and discover his secret. They give up their ghost hunting ways from shame, but create a more powerful enemy for Danny by doing so. PLEASE REVIEW!
1. New Neighbors

Hi everyone. Thanks for taking the time to read this story, because I like it when people read my work. Anyway, I'll gladly take any reviews, whether they're compliments, suggestions for what I could do better or any flames. Just one thing to _not_ put in a review: DON'T tell me what characters to change, who should get killed off, or any ideas you have that would change the plot. I outlined this entire story and I know exactly what's going to happen in it, and nothing you say will make me change what's been planned.

Anyway, you know all that legal stuff. I don't own Danny Phantom or anything related to it.

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Danny stared as he watched the moving trucks sitting outside the house across the street. His blue eyes were bored, but they also seemed a little depressed, for some reason. Just staring at the moving trucks across the street gave him a weird feeling, but he couldn't tell what it was. He saw two people standing outside the house with the moving trucks: they were middle aged people and looked like normal, everyday kind of people.

"Danny!" Jack yelled from downstairs. "Come down here and greet your new neighbors!"

Danny turned around and looked down the stairs as his parents were running around the entire house, trying to make everything look perfect inside the house. Maddie was putting bowls of potato chips and salsa out while Jack was vacuuming with something a device made from parts he claimed "once made up toilets".

The fourteen-year old slowly walked down the stairs, not looking very excited. It only took more excitement away when his "perfect" sister Jazz came running down the stairs after him. Her bright white teeth where shaped into an excited grin as her long red hair flew in the breeze she created when she came running down.

"Come on, little brother!" Jazz tried to encourage. "We're going to be meeting our new neighbors for the first time today! I _never_ thought someone would want to move here, especially across the street from mom and dad, but I guess some people are…"

Jazz cut herself off as she looked at her brother's bored expression. He looked like something was on his mind.

"Danny, what's the matter?" Jazz asked, turning her happy tone into a serious one. She put her hands on her hips and got ready to raise her voice.

"Jazz, you know how randomly a ghost attack can come!" Danny said with a concerned look on his face. "The last thing I need is more people to hide my secret from. One person sees me go from ghost to human, and I'm _toast_!"

"Oh relax, Danny," Jazz tried to say in a comforting voice as she gently rested her hand on Danny's shoulders. "I've seen these people unload their moving vans, and they look like really nice people. I'm sure you'll grow to like them."

Danny was about to say something, but his ogre of a father jumped at the foot of the stairs and looked at both of them.

"Danny! Jazz!" Jack yelled in an anxious tone, looking at both of them. "Are the rooms completely clean?"

"Yes, dad," the two kids said in unison.

"Is everything lying around on the floors stored in the closet?"

"Yes, dad."

"Okay. Sorry if I seem a bit insecure, but these _are_ new neighbors of ours, and we want to make the best impression we can!"

"Dad," Danny quietly moaned, "did you _have_ to invite them over the very day they moved into their new house? Shouldn't you have waited a day? Or week? Or something?"

"No time like the present, Danny!" his father said with a huge grin on his face. "Don't you want to get to know these great people!"

"Yeah, I don't really care."

"Great! They'll be here any second now!"

A few moments later, the doorbell rang. Everyone started acting all crazy and excited until Maddie finally just opened the door and greeted their two new neighbors from across the street. Their neighbors were a middle-aged couple. Most people would think they were friendly, but Danny thought there was something creepy about them.

"Good day to you, good sir," the man said. He put his hand out, ready to shake Jack's. Jack grabbed the man's hand and nearly crushed it when shaking it.

"Good day to you, too! So, what's your name, my good man?"

"My name is Paul Compton," the man said. "But you can just call me Paul, or Mr. Compton if you wish. This is my wife, Nadine. She and I have been married for over twenty years now."

"Oh, great," Danny moaned when his parents as Jazz were making small talk. He was just sitting back on the couch, watching everything play out and not really get involved. "They're British. Our new neighbors are British. It's going to be pretty hard for me to talk to them without laughing."

Danny continued watching as he put his right elbow on his leg and supported his head in his hand. He had the kind of blank stare that he only gave in school. "Oh well, I suppose it could be worse. They could be…"

"GHOST HUNTERS!" Danny yelled. Now, everyone was either on the couch or in a chair around the couch.

"Yes, we're ghost hunters," Mrs. Compton said with a smile on her face.

Even though her red goggles were covering her eyes, it was obvious Maddie's eyes were lighting up with happiness and excitement. "Ghost hunters for neighbors! Oh, that is so much more than I could have ever hoped for!"

"I know!" Jack yelled with excitement as well. "Well, if you guys are ghost hunters, you have definitely come to the right place. Maddie and I are ghost hunters ourselves, and we could really use some help trying to track down one particularly _nasty_ one."

"Hmm?" Mr. Compton asked.

"Him!" Jack yelled. He pulled a wanted poster out of his orange jumpsuit that had a picture of a ghost they had been hunting for a long time in the center of the page. It was the Ghost Child; it was Inviso-Bill; it was Danny himself. "We've been after that lousy ghosts for months, but every single time we get close to catching him, we end up losing him and he gets away! But we'll get him one of these days!"

Jack's face was getting very excited, and Danny tried his best not to look too nervous. But now, he had _four_ ghost hunters to avoid. Danny could tell life was going to be a lot harder.

"Come on!" Jack and Maddie yelled with delightful excitement. "Let us show you our lab!"

The two Fentons led the two Comptons down to their basement. The Comptons seemed evidently impressed with the equipment Jack had made for Ghost Hunting purposes. He showed them all the inventions he had made, from the ones that Danny could use to save someone's life to the inventions that never seemed to catch on.

"What might that thing be?" Mr. Compton said, pointing to a giant circular wall of steel in a far corner of the lab next to a bunch of dials.

"That, my good man, is the Ghost Portal! It opens up and can lead you to another dimension! That's where ghosts go when I capture them in the real world!"

_You mean, that's where they go when **I** catch them, _Danny mumbled to himself. He was really not in the mood for new neighbors to keep his secret from, especially if they were Ghost Hunters. His parents were the most incompetent ghost hunters he knew, and sometimes he could just barely sneak under their radar. Imagine how hard it would be trying to keep his cover from these British people who were probably much more sophisticated in ghost hunting than his parents.

The Comptons stayed for another few hours. Mr. Compton was a man who was only an inch or two taller than Danny and had a fair structure. His hair had some streaks of brown in it, but now it had mostly turned gray. Mrs. Compton was wearing glasses and was a little shorter and pudgier around the middle. Her hair was tied in a bun, but was also showing its age.

"Well, it was great to meet you, neighbors!" Jack said when the Comptons were leaving after the van unloaders just took all the furniture from the moving trucks and put it in the Comptons' new house. "Maybe we can go hunting together some time! Wouldn't that be spectacular!"

Mr. Compton just nodded his head, and then walked away and into his house. Jack just stared at them as they entered their house with a dopey grin on his face. He thought he and Maddie would get along really well with their new neighbors.

Danny was another story. He wasn't too big on the idea of having two more people to evade, but the fact they were ghost hunters made things all the more worse. He had to fight several ghosts almost every single day, and it would only be a matter of time before one of them found out and told everyone else that Danny Fenton was really Danny Phantom.

Later that night, Danny was getting tired and had to head up to bed soon.

"Remember, Danny," Maddie said, "you've got a curfew now! No staying out in the streets passed 9:30, or you'll be grounded until Jazz gets a B."

"Sounds like a long time," Danny said in a sarcastic, yet serious voice. "All right, I'll see you guys in the morning then."

Danny walked into his room and went over to his drawers. He started pulling out his pajamas, and just as he got ready to start changing into them, he opened his mouth and a thin blue mist came spurting out from his lips.

"Oh no," Danny moaned. He dropped his pajamas on the ground and clenched his fists. Instantly, a white circle formed around the center of his abdomen, then simultaneously started breaking apart from each other as they traveled in different vertical directions. Danny's casual white and red t-shirt changed to a black jumpsuit (same with his jeans); white gloves and boots appeared on his hands and feet; his dark black hair turned to a piercing shade of white, and his blue eyes turned to the color of slime. He had transformed into his alter ego, Danny Phantom.

Danny flew out the window and started looking around for where the ghost was that just triggered his ghost sense.

"Come on out," Danny said. "Wherever you are, can you please come out here so I can kick your butt and go to bed?"

There was silence for another second, then Danny saw a ghostly figure hop in front of him. The ghost had pale green skin, but looked very human. He had an eyeglass over his left eye and had a black cape tied around him. He looked like he was wearing very expensive clothes.

"Hah, what a whoosy ghost!" Danny mocked. He held out his hand and a green ball of energy started forming in it. After only a second or two, Danny launched the ball from his hand and it erupted into a thin stream of green ectoplasma. It hit the ghost right in the chest and sent him flying back.

"My, you seem quite strong," the ghost said in an almost Romanian-sounding accent.

"I don't know if I'm quite strong," Danny started, "as much as it is that you're quite weak."

"Oh, you must think you're so hilarious, don't you?" the ghost asked. With a flick of his wrist, his own blast of ectoplasma got sent flying at Danny. Danny was knocked backwards, but wasn't in nearly enough pain to give up.

"You know what, I'm not in any real mood for this tonight," Danny complained. He reached into his jumpsuit and pulled out the Fenton Thermos. "Now hold still so I can blast you to the ground and suck you into this and have you out of my life forever."

As soon as Danny finished unscrewing the lid from the thermos, he saw that the ghost had flown away. Danny saw the ghost, now over a hundred feet away. Danny wanted to go get him, but he was tired.

"Ah, who cares about him?" Danny asked, putting the lid back on the thermos. "He's a weakling, he can't really do anything. Now to go home and get some shut eye."

Danny reverted back to his human form and opened the door to his house, but as he touched the doorknob, a thought came to him.

_Gee, I've never seen that ghost before. I wonder who he is?_

Danny opened the door and was staring at the angry faces at both of his parents. Danny's curfew was 9:30, and he remembered that as he looked at the clock in the living room. That clock said it was 9:45.

Danny "stayed out" past his curfew. He was in some trouble now…


	2. The Truth Revealed

"Mom, dad, I can explain…" Danny started, putting his open hands in front of them as he stood in the doorway.

"Danny!" Jack yelled while wearing his pink and white striped pajamas and holding his teddy bear in his arms, "what do you think you're doing out fifteen minutes past your curfew!"

"I'm telling you, it's not my fault!" Danny said, trying to defend himself. His facial expressions gave away how scared he was for the punishment he was about to get. "Can you please just listen to me?"

"Daniel Fenton, you know there's nothing we hate more than when you stay out past your curfew! Do you have _any_ idea how much trouble you could've got in, or how much you could have been hurt out there?" his mom yelled, sounding angrier than someone on the Jerry Springer Show.

"Actually, I do," Danny said, starting to look away, "But you see…"

"You know the deal, then," Maddie said. "You are grounded for one week: no video games, no TV, no friends, no internet or computer, and no staying up later than 8:00!"

"Mom, you don't understand. Actually, I…"

"No more!" Maddie yelled. Her eyes were so angry, Danny thought that they would stick like it if she kept them in that position much longer. "Up to bed _right now!_"

Danny slumped his head and didn't say anything else. He slowly started walking up the stairs as they slowly creaked under his feet. He opened the door to his room. He was too depressed to take in the messy surroundings with clothes, school papers and assignments and some electronics scattered all over the floor.

He walked over to his bed and kicked his shoes off. He plopped down face-first on his bed and sighed. He was upset enough about having new neighbors to keep his secret from, but now he was grounded just because he was doing his job. He really didn't want to take it anymore.

"Why me?" Danny said in sad, muffled voice as he kept his face buried in his pillow. "I almost wish I never went into the Ghost Portal and got my DNA all mixed up. But, I guess there's no undoing it now. I just wish I could tell my parents about it. That would at least be _one_ weight off my shoulders."

Danny continued sighing until he sat up. When he sat up, a thin cloud of blue smoke come from his mouth. He gasped, and he knew what that meant: another ghost.

"I should definitely get paid vacation days for all this," the fourteen-year old mumbled. He leapt up from his bed and turned into his ghostly other half. He went intangible and flew out the window, then looked for the ghost that had just set off his ghost sense. It didn't take long.

Danny flew to the ground and saw a fancy-looking ghost with an eye glass staring at him, giving a big grin with two larger than normal front teeth.

"Good evening, my dear ghost friend," the ghost said in his Romanian accent.

"Ugh…_you_ again!" Danny yelled. "I just put up with you a few minutes ago, and because of you I got grounded! Don't you think you've caused me enough pain for one night?"

"Dear me, no," the ghost said, sounding like a snob. "Why, I'm just getting started."

"Yeah, well I've just about had enough!"

Danny didn't waste another moment. He fired a blast of ectoplasma at the ghost and knocked him against a tree a few feet away from the house. He seemed dazed a little, but quickly recovered and got back up.

The rich-looking ghost now had a very angry expression (Danny thought it had something to do with the last blast of energy breaking his eyeglass) and proceeded to counter Danny's attack. He formed a ball of energy of his own and fired it at Danny.

Danny was knocked back a little while, but didn't feel a lot of pain. He scoffed. "You know, I'm lucky a lot of ghosts like you are weaklings who can only give me injuries that I feel for less than half an hour."

"Well then, I suppose I should try harder," the ghost snidely replied.

"Look, I'm tired and I want to go to bed," Danny said. "So if you wouldn't mind just getting in the Fenton Themos and letting me release you back into the Ghost Zone, that'd be great."

The ghost started chuckling. "You cannot defeat me so easily. I will show you what happens when you doubt my greatness."

The ghost fired another blast at Danny, and it actually caused a lot more pain. "You see what happens when I try to deal a lot of pain? I can do it when I wish to."

Danny grunted as he got more and more frustrated with how much trouble this one ghost was. He finally didn't want to take it any more.

"All right, that does it," Danny said. "I'm not going to fight you at all. I'm just going to suck you into the Thermos and we can all live happily after, okay?"

But the ghost ran off and instead flew right into Danny's house. Danny's eyes widened with terror. "Oh man, I gotta get him out of my house! Who knows what he'll do? He'll probably wreck the entire place!"

Danny flew inside after the ghost and stopped him before the ghost did anything damaging to the inside.

"All right," Danny said, "I'm not holding back this time! Now, you're going to go into the thermos, or else!"

"Or else what?" the ghost challenged.

Danny grunted, and then fired a blast of energy from his hand and hit the ghost right in the gut with it. The ghost moaned and fell on the ground; he wasn't expecting Danny to be this strong.

The rich-looking, fancy-talking ghost was now on the ground after taking Danny's blast. Danny pulled the Fenton Thermos out of his jumpsuit again and opened up the lid. He didn't waste any time after that sucking the ghost into it.

"I…WILL…BE…STRONGER…" the ghost promised as he got sucked into the thermos. "JUST…YOU…WAIT…"

When the last molecule of the ghost was in the thermos, Danny instantly closed the lid. He was breathing heavy after the short fight, but didn't seem to have taken too much physical stress from it. He took in the quiet area around him after the battle, and liked how everything in the house was the same, meaning nothing was destroyed.

Danny kept the smile on his face as he walked down the stairs towards his house's basement. That was where most of the ghost-catching gadgets were, the biggest being the Ghost Portal: a portal to another dimension where the beings that humans consider ghosts live.

"All right, back to your fancy house," Danny said, sticking the thermos through the ghost portal and releasing the newly captured ghost in to it. "Now STAY OUT!"

Saying this, Danny still kept the grin on his face as he transformed back into his regular form. He started spinning the thermos around, at least being happy to know he wouldn't get bugged by that ghost again. Unfortunately for him, that happiness was short lived.

"Danny!" cried a surprised voice from behind.

Danny choked on the air in his throat. He recognized the voice coming from behind: it was his mom! He slowly turned around and saw both of his parents staring at him, in complete disbelief. The entire house went quiet as all three Fentons stayed silent, not knowing what to say. They had just seen Danny transform.


	3. Giving It Up

All three Fentons just stared at each other, not saying a single word. There are times when one small moment contains an event that will forever change your life, and this was definitely one of those moments for Danny. Danny had no idea what he was going to do now, or what his parents were going to do after finally learning the truth.

At first, Danny thought it would be a relief that he didn't have to keep his secret and he could talk to those who were close to him about almost anything now, but he was angry for some reason. He was angry that his parents had to be there and that they figured out what he had been trying to keep from them for months.

"So, all this time…" Jack started with a completely neutral face, "that whole time we were hunting down that Ghost Boy…it was really you."

Danny slumped his head and looked down at the metal floor, not knowing what to say. This just made him more upset, having to remember that his parents _did_ try to inadvertently kill him time and time again when they tried to capture "Inviso-Bill".

"Yeah," he finally said as he lifted his head up and looked at his two parents. "That ghost you were always trying to hunt down was me." Not knowing what else to say, Danny blurted out, "I'm sorry."

Jack and Maddie looked at each other. Both of them were at a loss for words as well. Once again, the entire basement fell silent as all the air and life in it seemed to fade away. After what seemed like forever, Danny spoke up.

"Are you guys cool with me being part ghost and all? I know it's pretty much your job to hunt ghosts down and exterminate them, but…" He was cut off. Maddie pointed her finger upwards and over her mouth, telling him to stop talking.

"Come on, Danny," she said in a sympathetic way. "Your father and I would never dream of trying to kill you, even if we were supposed to be hunting you down. Why didn't you tell us this earlier? We would have understood."

Danny felt like bursting into tears because he simply did not know what else to do, but something kept him from doing so. He looked up at his mom and said, "I didn't think you would believe me if I told you. I mean, really, would you _honestly_ believe someone if they said your son was half-ghost?"

"No, we wouldn't," Jack answered. "But now we know, and I think we can definitely get used to it."

"All right," Danny said, finally breaking a smile.

"Well, now that we're all up, why don't I make us some hot cocoa?" Maddie suggested as she started heading up the stairs. "Danny, you can tell us all about this then."

Danny just stayed silent, but then nodded his head.

About ten minutes later, all the Fentons (except for Jazz, she was asleep) were sitting in the kitchen, taking tiny sips from the hot cocoa that Maddie just made. Everyone was completely quiet until Jack finally said, "So, when do we tell Jazz?"

"She already knows," Danny glumly said, feeling stupid for some reason.

Maddie and Jack's eyes widened, and they both slammed their cups down on the table and swallowed the drink they had in their mouths hard.

"How long has she known?" Maddie asked as if she were interrogating someone. (and Danny felt exactly like he was in an interrogation segment)

"You know, I really have no clue," Danny said, putting his elbow on the table and cradling the bottom of his head in it. "But I think she's known for a while, but she only told me she knew a few months ago."

"So, we were the only ones who didn't know?" Maddie asked. "What about your friends, Sam and Tucker?"

"They knew, too," Danny said, feeling more upset every time he answered the same question. "So yeah, you guys were pretty much the only ones who didn't know." At no point while saying this did Danny look them right in the eyes.

There was another deathly silence, until Jack started speaking. "Well then, why didn't you tell _us_? We're your parents! We of all people should be able to understand."

"But your ghost hunters," Danny said, "and newsflash: I'm part ghost! I thought you guys would feel…actually, I didn't know what you'd think, but I knew it would hurt either me or you guys."

"What's it been like with those powers?" Jack asked with some life in his voice, as if he was getting a little excited. "Did you get anything cool?"

"I guess," Danny said, "but I've had to use them to fight off a bunch of other ghosts that have come through that portal down in the basement."

"That portal…" Jack said in a mystical tone, almost like he was decoding some secret message within the words.

"It's got its drawbacks," Danny continued. "Yeah, they're great for protecting me and everyone else, but so many ghosts bother me on a daily basis I wish I didn't have any powers at all. I've just been through so much since I got them; it's really hurting my social and school life."

Maddie and Jack looked at each other, this time with sympathy and trying to understand Danny's feelings. But most of all, they were trying to figure out what to do now that the truth was out.

"You see," Danny said, breaking the silence, "I never wanted my powers in the first place. You have no idea how much I would love it for all the ghosts to just disappear and I could finally stop having to fight the same ones over and over again."

Danny's parents looked like they were in deep thought about what needed to be done now, but it suddenly looked like Jack had an idea. He got up, looking like he was about to do something he was going to regret and looked at Danny.

"Son," he started, "I think it's best you head up to bed now. You have school in the morning, you know."

"And you're not grounded," Maddie said with a sad smile on her face without even talking to Jack about it.

"Thanks, you guys," Danny said, actually smiling for the first time since his secret was revealed.

Without saying another word, Danny went upstairs to his room and tried his best to go to sleep, but it was hard. He was trying to process everything that just happened, and how it would dramatically change his ghost hunting life. He knew that after tonight, things were going to be different for him when he was battling ghosts. Maybe this would be a good thing, or maybe it would be more negative.

Danny finally got to sleep, but his parents learning his secret was the first thing he thought of when he woke up the next morning. Even though the thought was still weighing heavily on his mind, he carried on the in morning like he normally would. He got cleaned up and dressed and went down to have breakfast.

Maddie was preparing some food in the kitchen for Danny when he walked down, but she seemed really nervous about being around him. She was letting out nervous laughs every time she talked to him, and it happened to the extent where Danny couldn't take it anymore.

"All right mom, you can stop sounding so freaked now!" Danny said as his mother passed him a plate with eggs and a few strips of bacon in it. "It's okay, really. You and dad were just doing your jobs as ghost hunters, and I can understand you'd be upset about finding out. Heck, _I'm_ upset about you finding out!"

"But the fact that the ghost we were hunting was _you_ all along just makes me feel so awful."

"Well, I _did_ try to tell you guys he wasn't all that bad," Danny said as he started eating. "But please, just don't tell anyone, all right? _Especially_ the Comptons."

"You got it," Maddie said, trying to sound as natural and as pleasant as possible.

"Thanks. You don't have to treat me any different, you know. I just don't want you or dad telling anyone about this, because I could have enemies lurking around and they could take you guys prisoner, or something like that."

Danny continued eating in the awkward surroundings until he put his fork down and pasted a questioning look on his face. "Speaking of which, where _is _dad?"

"He's down in the lab," Maddie said. "He's been down there all night working on something, and he seemed pretty upset about doing it."

"What's he doing?"

"I don't know," Maddie confessed. "He doesn't want me or you down there right now."

"Does it have something to do with me being part ghost?"

"I'm guessing it does."

Danny had a brick expression, but then looked at a clock in the kitchen. "Well, I gotta go to school. Bye, mom!"

Danny grabbed his backpack and burst from the house as quickly as he could and started heading towards school. He was happy to get away from that awkward scene, but the thought still lingered in his mind about what it was his dad was doing down in the lab. Feeling like he had to talk to someone about last night's events, Danny turned to the only people he trusted: his two best friends, Sam and Tucker.

Shortly after school ended, the trio was walking home, and it didn't take long for Sam and Tucker to realize that something was seriously wrong.

"Hey man, you okay?" Tucker asked after a short silence. "You look like you just got turned down by every girl in the school."

"I don't know if that's as bad as my parents figuring out my secret," Danny said, still looking straight ahead at neither of them.

Sam and Tucker lost their breath for a second, and then looked at each other out of the corner of their eyes. They both were at a loss for words, so Danny continued talking. "I was fighting some snobby sounding ghost, and when I finally finished with him I went back to my human form. Except…well…my parents were kind of watching."

Both of his friends continued to stay silent, until Sam finally spoke up. "Well, what are you going to do now?"

"I don't know," Danny said, pretending to be scratching the back of his neck. "They both seemed pretty sorry that I turned out to be the ghost they were hunting down all this time, and my dad's doing something down in the lab now, but I got no idea what that is."

The rest of the walk home was silent. (other than a few "See you tomorrow"s.) Danny walked into his house, and for some reason, it felt much different. He felt as if he was going to see their parents and they would be completely different people towards him.

To his surprise, the house seemed empty. Danny thought no one was home until he heard something coming from the basement. He gently put his backpack down on the floor and walked over to the staircase leading down. He began walking down the stairs and saw his dad looking like some mad scientist trying to set up a complex procedure for an experiment.

"Uh…dad?" Danny nervously asked.

Danny's father turned around, but he looked completely different. He was still wearing the pajamas he was wearing when he first found out about Danny's secret, but there were now wrinkled and had sweat all over them. Under his eyes were dark circles, and even though he was still the same obese person, Danny thought he looked much lankier.

"Are you okay?" Danny asked with a lot of concern.

"Son, I'm giving up," Jack said in almost proud tone.

"Giving up? What do you mean?"

"I'm giving up ghost hunting," Jack clarified. "After finding out the thing I was hunting for the most was my own son, I decided to give up."

"But you love to hunt for ghosts!" Danny yelled. "You're not _really_ giving up?"

"Yes, I am," Jack said with shame in his voice. "I've been trying to get rid of the ghost portal most of all. That way, no more ghosts can come and annoy you."

"But dad, where will I put the loose ones that I _do _catch? Where will those go if the portal's closed? I can't just leave them in the thermos forever, you know."

"Look, Danny!" Jack yelled in a sharp and aggressive tone, "I'm quitting ghost hunting and everything related to it, and nothing you say is going to stop me! I'm going to finish up the invention I've almost completed now, and then no more inventions or hunting."

"But I could really use those inventions!" Danny insisted, starting to feel upset that his secret getting out was causing his dad to give up the thing he loved the most.

"Danny, I think you've been the one keeping those ghosts on the run, not my inventions. I think you'll do fine without them."

"Uh…if you say so," Danny weakly said. _Maybe it will be good,_ he thought to himself. _Dad giving up ghost hunting, me not having to hide my secret anymore…maybe we can all just live happily ever after then. Yeah, we can just be a regular family now! This could be the greatest thing that's ever happened._

Jack turned away and went back over to the portal, trying to figure out what dials he should switch and what wires needed to be cut. Danny just watched grimly as he saw his dad destroy everything that was once so important to him. Finally, the guilt set in and Danny couldn't take it anymore.

"Dad, stop it!" Danny yelled, his blue eyes filling with rage. "This is ridiculous! Don't give up ghost hunting just because you figured out my secret. Now quit destroying the lab already!"

"Danny, I already told you!" Jack yelled angrily, turning away. Apparently, not getting any sleep for over the past thirty-six hours made him very edgy. "I'm giving up ghost hunting, and that's that!"

But while he was talking to Danny and had his attention diverted, Jack accidentally hit a certain wire on the portal with his elbow. Instantly, a thick stream of hot electricity burst from the wire and instantly connected itself to Danny.

Danny stood frozen in his position as the hot electricity pulsed right through him and sent shock waves throughout his entire body. He could open his eyes for one moment and saw that the electricity that connected to him was now angled at a position that the electricity was flowing from him _into_ the open ghost portal. Basically, there was a straight line of electricity flowing between Danny and into the Ghost Zone, but where the electricity was hitting in the Ghost Zone was unknown.

After a few seconds, Danny suddenly felt like something had become a _part_ of him; he felt like something almost human had just entered his body while the electricity was flowing from him into the ghost portal.

Finally, Jack was able to stop the flow of electricity and shut the power off. The flow of electricity suddenly shut off and Danny looked like he just had twenty balloons rubbed all over him. Finally, he just collapsed from the heat of the electricity that had just passed through him and connected to somewhere in the Ghost Zone. Now, he was lying on the ground, unconscious.


	4. Third Time's the Charm

Before I start Chapter 4, let me thank everyone who has reviewed this story so far. Sailerstar, Serenity, Dani, Lepper, Weirdit and King, thank you so much for taking the time to read and review this. Since you probably don't know, I get most of my motivation to continue writing from reviews, so every time you guys write a review, it encourages me to keep going. Thanks for the reviews and please keep them coming!

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Danny slowly woke up, and he felt something cold and hard on the back of his neck. When he regained his senses, he saw that he was still lying on the floor of his dad's lab. Jack and left the lab, though, so Danny was all alone down there.

After just lying there, doing nothing for a few seconds, Danny finally got up and made a few grunting sounds while he was doing so. He looked around, and the entire lab still seemed normal. The ghost portal still looked operational, so his dad obviously didn't have much success closing it down.

Danny quietly walked up the stairs to the basement and went in to the kitchen. The kitchen was also empty, and he could soon see why. The clock in the basement read 11:30 P.M.

In other words, everyone had gone to bed and left the lights on for Danny in case he woke up in the middle of the night and forgot where he was or needed to find his way back up from the basement.

It was only another minute or so before Danny was up in his room, in his pajamas, and slipping under the covers of his bed. He tried to get to sleep, but it was hard. He assumed it was hard because he had just been knocked unconscious for a long time and had a lot of his energy charged. Maybe some deep thinking would help him get to sleep.

_Dad's not really giving up ghost hunting, is he?_ Danny thought to himself as he lay with his arms bent and the bottom half lay beneath the pillow. He stared up at the ceiling as if he were talking to it. _And what about mom? Is she going to give up her ghost hunting ways as well? Why would they do that, just because they learned my secret? I can understand them feeling guilty I guess, but what am I going to do then? Those gadgets and weapons they make are very helpful to me when I'm battling ghosts. If I don't have any new ones, how can I hope to defeat the really nasty ones? And if I need them, shouldn't that only encourage my parents to keep hunting?_

A lot of other questions raced through Danny's mind. Questions like, "How is my life going to be different?" or "How are mom and dad's lives going to be different?". Other questions that raced through Danny's head, such as "Should I tell Jazz? She already knows I'm part ghost, so it shouldn't matter too much to her." Another question pulsed through Danny's mind: Should he give up ghost fighting, too? No, that wouldn't work. If his parents quit ghost hunting and he gave up ghosts, who else would there be to hunt? Of course, there would always be the Comptons to help…

But the biggest question in Danny's mind was "What do I do now?". That question was the one that stumped Danny the most, because it was the hardest to answer.

Danny eventually drifted off to sleep with those two questions remaining in his mind. He woke up the next morning, and once again, had no choice but to continue his daily routine and hope that nothing would go wrong that day.

The school day went by very slowly. Even though Danny could concentrate a little more than he could the day before, his mind was still occupied with how his life was going to change now.

After school finally ended, Danny was walking home with Sam and Tucker as always.

"So, Danny, any news on what your parents are going to do?" Sam asked.

"My dad says he's going to give up ghost hunting," Danny said in a sad way. (he never thought he'd hear himself say that sadly)

"No way!" Tucker shrieked. "Isn't that a family tradition or something? What's he going to do then?"

"I have no idea," Danny said. "But I told him it was a dumb idea. As embarrassing as he can be with all those weird ghost inventions, they've turned out to be pretty helpful every now and then. Now he says he's going to finish up one last invention and call it quits."

Sam and Tucker waited for one of them to say something, but it never happened. The walk was pretty quiet until something unexpected happened.

"Ow!" Danny shrieked out of the wild blue. He bent downwards and started clutching at his side, almost like a spear had just been thrown into it.

"Danny, what happened!" Sam asked.

"I…I dunno," Danny confessed. His eyes were squeezed shut, but occasionally opened and closed. He was still clutching his side. "I was just walking and I suddenly felt a stabbing pain. Gahhh…"

"Do you think you pulled something while walking?" Tucker asked.

"No, it was completely random," Danny assured. "I felt like some sort of weapon just hit me. That's all I can really say to describe it."

"You've had a bit of a stressful week," Sam tried to say comfortingly. "Maybe it's just your body wearing down. You should rest when you get home."

Danny just nodded, and even sighed a little while doing so. "I think you guys are right. Oh well, see you tomorrow."

Danny turned away from his friends and started walking in the direction of his own house. He walked in through the door, but didn't say anything, even if someone was around. Now that his secret was out, he felt really uncomfortable being around his parents.

Danny headed up to his room and plopped down on his bed. He was bored, and wasn't in the mood to do anything. He figured he might as well at least try to be productive and get his homework done.

After doing his homework for a while, Danny suddenly froze up. A small gas came from his mouth, and a puff of blue smoke with it. There was obviously a ghost nearby.

Danny sprung up from his bed and screamed his battle cry. "I'm going ghost!"

Just like before, a white circle appeared around Danny's section and instantly split itself into two parts, each one started to flow across a vertical half of his body. When both circles completed their path, Danny had now transformed and was about to take on his first ghost fight since his parents learned of his dark secret.

Danny flew out of the window and started hovering a few feet above the ground. He looked for the ghost that was just setting off his ghost sense. Finally, he turned around and saw the problem.

"Oh no," Danny moaned, but not in a sad or worried moan. This moan was much more exasperated. "Why do you keep showing up in my life!"

It was the fancy ghost that was indirectly responsible for Danny getting grounded for breaking his curfew, but he was also the reason Danny's parents learned his secret.

The ghost chuckled, then charged up a ball of ectoplasma energy in his hand and prepared to fire it at Danny. Danny ducked out of the way just in time and the energy went flying harmlessly passed them.

"Seriously," Danny said a short while after recovering from the dodge. "You keep coming here and making my life harder than you already have. Man, you're gonna be a in a lot of trouble. No more!"

Danny fired his own blast of energy as hard and as fast as he could, but the ghost seemed to be much quicker than Danny anticipated and was able to dodge the blast as well.

"Ah, we both seem to be blessed with extraordinary speed," the fancy ghost said. "Then this will be quite an interesting little gathering."

"Quit talking fancy," Danny said. "Jazz watching the BBC channel gives me enough of that!"

The two were about to start really fighting each other and trying their best to kill the other, but they both heard a door opening a few yards away. Both ghosts looked at where the sound was coming.

"Ah, two ghosts! That was more than I could have ever hoped for! Cheerio, both of you!" screamed someone. It was Mr. Compton, and he had what looked like a very sophisticated-looking piece of ghost hunting equipment in his hand. It looked like a Fenton Bazooka, but much smaller and lighter-looking. Danny was now worried, knowing he'd have to dodge both the mysterious ghost's blasts and his new neighbor's ghost weapon as well.

The mysterious, fancy ghost, seeing that now he was in a bit of a jam as well, retreated as fast as he could. He flew off so fast Danny couldn't see him, and when Danny turned his attention back to Mr. Compton, he turned around just in time to see a blast from Mr. Compton's bazooka hit him right in the face.

Danny got knocked backwards by the blast and was smashed back into the side of his house. He moaned a little, but something happened a moment or two afterwards that surprised him. Danny heard the fancy ghost, but he was also screaming in great pain.

Mr. Compton heard the other ghost scream, and thinking he had beaten Danny enough, ran off to where the fancy ghost's scream was coming from so he could blast that ghost, too.

"Ah ha!" Mr. Compton yelled after looking around. "There you are!"

"Guess he found that weird, rich-talking ghost," Danny said to himself as he was still recovering from the pain he was in from Mr. Compton's blast. "Man, that guy knows how to make some strong weapons! I'd better watch out for him."

Danny reverted back to his human form when he was sure Mr. Compton wasn't looking and ran back into his house. He was breathing heavy after that short fight.

"Okay, this is getting bad," Danny said. "That weird ghost with the eyeglass is probably just going to keep coming up to me and bugging me, so it looks like I'm going to have to have the Fenton Thermos ready at all times. But then again, I also need to watch out for Mr. Compton. He doesn't seem to be very merciful when it comes to ghost hunting."

Now, Danny's problems were getting a little more serious. It had been two nights since Danny first met the mysterious ghost that talked with a funny, yet fancy accent. Danny had encountered the ghost three times now, and it didn't look like the ghost was ready to stop any time soon. Luckily for Danny, Mr. Compton looked like he would be able to keep that weird ghost on the run for a while.

But that was a double-edged sword. Now Danny knew that Mr. Compton wasn't merciful towards ghosts, and it looked like while Danny was in his ghost form, Mr. Compton would be a great threat.

Just as Danny was trying to figure out how to keep his cover from both obstacles, he suddenly felt like someone dropped a wrecking ball on his back. He screamed in pain and then dropped to the ground, moaning in pain. He could barely move; the pain was practically as bad, if anything, worse than the blast he had suffered from Mr. Compton's bazooka.

After a little while, the pain subsided and Danny began crawling up. This was a third problem that he had to add to his plate. In addition to keeping himself safe from the weird ghost and Mr. Compton, Danny now also had to figure out why he kept feeling these weird bursts of pain. He thought that it could have been a possibility that he pulled something when his side started aching earlier that day (just as Tucker suggested), but now he was sure the back pain and the side pain were somehow related.

"This is really weird," Danny said. "Who's that weird ghost? And how do I get Mr. Compton to stop attacking me while at the same time not telling him I'm a ghost. And why do I keep feeling these random pains in my side or back!"

The answers would soon come.


	5. Another One

The questions still lingered in Danny's head the rest of the day: Why did he keep getting those random pains? And who was the ghost he had to fight three times? And what was he going to do about Mr. Compton? Danny definitely did not want more ghost hunters to look out for.

The rest of the afternoon dragged on. Aside from the sharp pain he felt after the fancy ghost disappeared and Mr. Compton went off to attack him, nothing else was unusual. He tried to relax the best he could, but considering the recent events, it was pretty difficult to.

The night seemed to drag on and on. Danny got through dinner and any homework he still had to do, and now he just wanted to relax in his bedroom and try his best to figure everything out. At worst, he'd just have to remind himself that he could make it through this time.

Danny didn't know what to do after a while, so a little after 9:00 he went downstairs to say goodnight to his parents. Just as he was about to head up to bed, he was stopped.

"Danny, hold on a second," Jack said as Danny began walking up the stairs. Danny froze and turned around and looked to see what his dad wanted. He saw that his dad had a small device that could fit into anyone's pocket. It was a small gray box, and it had a little latch on the tip of it to open it.

Danny could help but look at the device with confusion. After staring at it for a few seconds, he looked back up at his dad. "What is it?"

"Well, I don't really know what to call it, but I guess you could say the Fenton-Gasser," Jack said, practically improvising what came out of his mouth.

"The Fenton-Gasser?"

"Yup," Jack said proudly. "You see that little thing up at the top that you can slide open?"

"Uh-huh."

"That is only to be opened in the case of an emergency. When opened, it releases a super-thick cloud of vapor that contains toxic chemicals. This time, I made sure those chemicals were only toxic to _pure_ ghosts, so they wouldn't hurt you if you breathed them in."

"This is great, dad," Danny said in a low tone, "but when am I going to use this?"

"Well, you seem to be fighting ghosts a lot. Maybe if you're surrounded by them you could use it to fend them all off? I don't know, use your imagination. After all, that's going to be the last gadget I make."

"I think that's a pretty bad idea," Danny confessed, "but if you say so…"

After that short conversation and putting his dad's final invention in his pocket, Danny turned around and continued heading up the stairs to his room. He walked in through the bedroom door and groaned.

The next morning came quickly. Danny got ready to go to school very quickly and was walking in through the doors in no time. And today, he had one of his least favorite classes first: chemistry.

Danny sat down in the same old classroom as Lancer prepared to set up everything for the lab they were going to do in class that day. Finally, after everything was put together and everyone was seated, Lancer began speaking.

"Students," he said in his neutral, uncaring voice, "today, we are going to be doing a lab that will tell us exactly how many calories are in a single peanut."

"Whoa, slow down," Danny mumbled sarcastically under his breath. He had better things to worry about than finding out how many calories were in a peanut and then having to write a paper on it.

"But first, some safety features," Lancer continued explaining. "Most important of all, there is going to be an open flame in this room during the experiment. So, I'd like everyone to point to the fire extinguisher."

A lot of kids pointed to the fire extinguisher in the back corner of the room, with a few groans and laughs that Lancer was making them do something pointless like that.

"Very good," Lancer praised. "Now, does anyone know _why_ a fire extinguisher puts out a fire?"

One student raised her hand. "It suffocates it?"

"Very good," Lancer said with a way-too-happy smile on his face. "Yes, the gases and steam suffocates the fire so the fire can't get any oxygen, and without any oxygen, the fire will die."

"Wow, learned something new already," Danny growled as he just sat and watched Lancer lecture the entire room.

The experiment started, and the entire class was pretty boring after that. Danny was with Sam and Tucker in a group, and he took that opportunity to tell them what was going on.

"Guys, some really weird things have been happening lately," Danny whispered when no one else was paying attention. The three of them now had lab coats on top of their regular clothes, and were wearing goggles. They were trying carefully to light a burner without accidentally burning themselves.

"What's shaking ya?" Tucker asked.

"You see, I've been feeling these pains more and more," Danny whined. "Remember yesterday how my side suddenly gave in? Well, after you guys left, a weird ghost who looks like a billionaire from nineteenth century England came and attacked me. We were about to fight until my new neighbor Mr. Compton came out with his ghost hunting equipment and broke up the fight. The weird ghost flew away and Mr. Compton followed him, and after a minute or two, I felt another stabbing pain in my back."

"What do you think it is?" Sam asked.

"I don't know," Danny admitted. "That's why I'm asking you guys: to see if _you_ have any idea about why I'm feeling all this pain."

"Like I suggested yesterday, I think it's just stress," Sam inputted. "What else could it be?"

Danny groaned. His friends obviously didn't have any greater idea about why he was getting these random sharp pains than he did. He thought they'd be natural, but he got some inkling that told him he wasn't "just feeling" those weird pains.

The day finally ended, and Danny was once again walking home from school. When he and his friends went their separate ways during the walk back, Danny got a nasty surprise. A ghost popped up from under the sidewalk and was right in front of Danny's face. It let out a hissing sound, trying to intimidate him.

"Okay, you really need some mints," Danny cracked at the ghost. He dropped his bag and instantly went into Ghost-Mode. He started by firing a regular blast of energy at the ghost, and it hit the ghost right on.

The ghost got knocked backwards, but it was up again in no time. It started forming a blast of energy between its two hands, but it was so slow that Danny could form another ball of ectoplasma in the time it took for the ghost to charge up its attack. Taking the opportunity, Danny fired it at the ghost and ruined the entire process of it attacking.

"Okay, are you here to fight, or did you have a death wish?" Danny asked, "because I am _not_ in any mood to put up with ghosts that waste my time like you do."

Danny started charging up one more ball of ectoplasma in his hand to fire at the ghost, who was staring at Danny with fear in its eyes.

Just as Danny was about to give the finishing blast, he suddenly felt a blast of ectoplasma it his wrist.

"Ow!" he shrieked, gripping his wrist. He looked up and saw the ghost get away. He stared angrily as he saw it escape without serious injury, then just let out a painful breath and looked at his wrist. He then looked to the side and saw a girl ghost standing there.

The girl ghost looked like she was sorry for something. She seemed beautiful and had very pale skin. She had a thin structure and was wearing very soft, light clothes.

"I'm so sorry," she said in a foreign accent. "I was aiming for the other ghost. I am so sorry to have hit you."

"Uh…it's really no big deal," Danny lied, trying not to make her feel bad.

"My name is Aria," the ghost said. "I've been looking all over for someone like you."

"You have?" Danny asked with surprise. A smile was even starting to spread across his face. "What for?"

"There is something very terrible going on in the Ghost Zone," Aria gently said. Her voice was actually almost soothing.

"Like what? Is a ghost bothering you? Because if there is, I'm gonna teach him a lesson in respect he'll never forget."

"Please, come with me into the Ghost Zone. I want to show you what's going on," Aria sad in a low voice.

The entire street became quiet. Danny put two fingers on his chin and pondered what he should do. He was a bit doubtful of this ghost. After all, he only met her less than a minute ago.

"I'm not going to regret this, am I?" Danny asked, concerned about whether or not following Aria into the Ghost Zone would be the smartest decision.

"Please," Aria softly begged. "I need your help."

"All right," Danny said, finally agreeing.

Aria's face lit up with excitement. "Thank you!" she exclaimed breathlessly. "Do you know of any way we can get into the Ghost Zone close to here?"

"Yeah, my dad actually has a portal around here," Danny said. He led Aria inside and down into the basement, doing his absolute best to stay quiet just in case anyone was home. The last thing his parents would want to see would be Danny leading a girl ghost around the house, especially since they now knew his secret.

When they were in the basement, Danny went over to the ghost portal and hit all the buttons he had to press to open it. Instantly, the massive metal doors started opening, revealing a swirling green spiral within the portal.

"Splendid," Aria said with a smile on her face. She gently turned her heads toward Danny.

"Well, shall we?" she asked.

Danny nodded his head, and then both of them jumped through the portal. A split second later, they were in another world, another dimension. Aria floated in front of him, about to fill him in.

"I think it's best you let me lead the way," Aria suggested. "I doubt you know what I want to show you."

Danny agreed, and then let Aria lead the way. Danny followed Aria as she led him to some unknown location where a bunch of terrible things were happening, but he tried to pay very close attention to where he was going. After all, it could be a trap. Or, he would have to remember the way back to the ghost portal.

Danny tried his best to follow Aria while still taking in everything around him as he flew through the long, dark abyss. He knew he was getting himself into something by following Aria to where she claimed trouble was, but he had no idea what that something was.

"Here we are," Aria finally said after a somewhat long flight. Danny looked around, and all he saw was a floating island in the middle of nowhere. There was a very large forest on the island, but the thing standing out the most was a giant mansion that was looming over that forest.

Danny stared at the massive building on the floating island. "This is where all the problems are?" he asked, trying to make sure he understood everything.

"Yes," Aria softly responded.

So, Danny now knew that the center of Aria's problems (as well as possibly other ghosts' problems) was a giant mansion in an isolated area of the Ghost Zone with a dense patch of woods behind it. And he was staring right at it, ready to take on whatever challenges awaited him in that mansion.


	6. Breaking the News

Danny continued to stare at the massive house that he was floating in front of. It was hard to believe someone would actually live in this white house, especially with all the mold that seemed to be growing around it.

"This is the mansion of Count Xissil Van Horrick," Aria said in her normal, sad voice. (Zees-ill Vahn Orick, if you wanted to know how to pronounce it) "He is one of the richest ghosts in the entire Ghost Zone. But he gets that through power, and he just can't seem to have enough of it."

Danny slowly flew over to a window, but still listened to what Aria had to say. He peered in through the dusty window and he saw someone walking around in there.

"It's him!" Danny yelled. "That's the guy who fought me three times! It's him!"

"What are you talking about?" Aria asked.

"That ghost in that house! I've had to fight him three times this week!" Danny yelled. "The one with the eyeglass!"

"That's Van Horrick," Aria said, not looking at Danny. "He's a very brutal person. He wants staggering amounts of power that would bring anyone to their knees."

"That ghost is that Van Horrick guy?" Danny said, still looking in the window at the ghost as he continued pacing around.

"Yes," Aria said, now with a little fear starting to rise in her voice. "I simply could not take the thought of him gaining any more power, so I came to your world to look for help."

"And you found me?" Danny said, a little bit surprised.

"Yes. I was not looking for anyone in particular, but after I saw how you were able to fight off that ghost a little while ago, I knew you were the right person for the job."

"Job? What job?"

"Someone needs to teach Horrick a lesson," Aria said. "He is a very powerful ghost. He may look older and weak, but he is actually a very skilled fighter. No one in the ghost zone has the courage to take him down."

"And you want me to do it?" Danny asked, making sure he understood what Aria was talking about.

"Yes. After seeing your skill against that ghost when you were walking home, I knew that you probably had the potential to destroy him. Are you up to the challenge."

Danny didn't waste any time talking. "Duh, of course I am! That ghost has been giving me trouble all week. I think it's about time I showed him what happens when you mess with me!"

A smile spread across Aria's face, which was the first time Danny had ever seen it. Normally, he would have liked the feeling of knowing that he was helping someone out, but this time, he was helping ghosts out. Ghosts had now become his biggest problem, but he was still glad to be trying to beat that Van Horrick guy. After all, this was now a matter of revenge more than trying to help out others.

"All right," Danny said, "time for me to get my sweet revenge!" He was about to burst through the doors to the mansion when Aria grabbed him by the back of his jumpsuit and pulled him back. "Hey, what gives?"

"Van Horrick is so strong that he could actually defeat you quite easily now," Aria said in a sorrowful manner. "I want you to head back home and practice on your skills for you to fight him."

"Oh, come on!" Danny yelled. "You know how many ghosts I've fought that ultimately ended up beating me? None! I told you, I can take this sucker on now, so let me go!"

Aria seemed to pull harder to keep him back. "And _I_ told you he's very powerful. How do you think he's gotten this entire area of the Ghost Zone to fear him if he isn't powerful?"

Danny just groaned. Now that he knew who the ghost was that had been causing him so much trouble over the past few days, he wanted nothing more than to run in there, rip off that ghost's face, stuff it in a package and mail it to him for Christmas. But, Aria insisted that Horrick was too powerful, even for him, so he had no choice but to go back for now.

"I want you to go home so you can train to battle him," Aria said. "I want nothing more than to see him lose his power and go down hard and painfully."

"All right," Danny said, not knowing what else to say. "Well, I guess I'd better be going home now."

At that moment, Danny leapt into the air and started flying through the Ghost Zone, trying his best to remember what way he came. After a few minutes, he found the entrance of the portal back to his house's basement.

Danny floated through the circle of light in the portal, and was now back in his own basement, looking as deserted and empty as ever. There was something really creepy about it now that Jack had forsaken his ghost hunting ways.

Danny reverted himself back to his regular form and was now ready to take a breather and try to understand everything that was going on now. But as soon as Danny walked up the stairs to his basement and sat down in an chair, ready to think things through, he heard a knock on the door. Groaning, he got up to answer it, and he didn't like it when he found out who was there.

"M…Mr. Compton?" Danny asked, surprised. He was afraid of Mr. Compton, now that he had seen the "Ghost Boy" face to face and knew for a fact he existed. He was officially a threat to Danny now.

"Good afternoon, Danny," Mr. Compton said with a pleasant smile on his face.

"Uh…hi," Danny said, not knowing how he should have greeted Mr. Compton. "What's up?"

"I'm looking for a ghost," he said. "You know, the one with the white hair and the green eyes?"

"Huh?" Danny said, freezing up. He didn't want to say something stupid and give himself away. "Uh, yeah I guess I know him. I mean, at least my dad does."

"Well, do you have any idea where I could find him?"

"NO!" Danny yelled with a burst of energy. He was trying to stay covert, but he had a feeling that screaming "No!" at the top of his lungs wasn't the best way to do it.

"You okay?" Mr. Compton asked. "You don't need to get defensive about it, I'm simply asking if you've seen him?"

"Uh, yeah…I know him," Danny said, not knowing what else to say.

"Well, I'm hunting him down," Mr. Compton said. "I saw him earlier today and I want to capture him _alive_. So, do you have any idea where I could find him?"

"You know, he's misunderstood!" Danny yelled. He knew that didn't answer Mr. Compton's question, and he hoped it didn't make him sound too suspicious. After all, having another ghost hunter looking for him was the last thing he needed.

"What are you talking about?"

"He's not a bad guy!" Danny insisted. "He tries to help people and save them, not hurt them! And you know, he keeps a lot of the other ghosts who attack this town at bay! He _protects_ this town!"

"What are you talking about?" Mr. Compton asked. "All I did was ask if you knew where he was. If you don't know where he is, you just had to say you didn't! Now, just answer me: do you know where to find him!"

"No," Danny calmly said. "I don't."

"All right, then," Mr. Compton said. "All you had to do was say so."

Saying that, Mr. Compton walked out of the doorway and back towards his house. But as he was walking away, he saw something out of the corner of his eyes that seemed to grab his attention.

"Ah ha!" he yelled. "You're mine!"

Danny watched as Mr. Compton ran down the streets, pulling any ghost equipment out of his coat and running down the streets with it.

"Hmmm…my ghost sense didn't go off," Danny said softly to himself. "Oh well, if there _is_ a ghost out there, it sounds like Mr. Compton has it taken care of."

Danny was sitting quietly for a while until he realized he had forgotten something: he forgot to tell Jazz that their parents knew his secret now. He looked up the stairs to where Jazz's room was, and he took a deep breath. Slowly, he started walking up the stairs, trying to be as quiet as possible.

When he was at the door to Jazz's room, he quietly knocked. He didn't know why he was so nervous about telling her their parents knew, but for some reason, he was.

"Come in," Jazz said.

Danny quietly opened the door to find Jazz spread out across her bed, reading a book. "Oh, hey little brother," she said cheerfully. "How's it going?"

Danny was now really nervous about telling her for some reason. He tried to be as natural as possible, but it was only making the scene more awkward. He tried to make a conversation starter.

"So, uh…what are you reading?"

"Oh, this?" Jazz asked, looking at the book in her hands. "Oh, it's a great book called _Lord of the Flies_. You see, it's a political metaphor where…"

"All right, all right!" Danny said, loudly interrupting her. "Sorry, but after reading _Animal Farm,_ I'm not in any mood for political metaphors in books."

"Uh…okay?" Jazz said, really confused with what was going on. "I'm almost done with it, you know. The ending is great! It has a kid named Ralph running from a bunch of savage kids who set a jungle on fire and…"

"All right!" Danny yelled again. "Look, there's something I kind of think I should tell you."

"Really?" Jazz asked, putting a bookmark in her book and closing it. She gently set it down on the floor and stared at Danny. "What's up?"

"Well…mom and dad…kinda found out about me being half ghost and all," Danny said, looking at the floor.

Jazz's expression looked completely shocked. "Since when?"

"A night or two ago," Danny said. "I was fighting some ghost, and…well, they saw me change into my different form and…yeah, that's just about." So much for a non-awkward way of saying it now.

"Well, what'd they do?"

"Dad's giving up on the ghost hunting," Danny said, still not looking at her. "And I don't know what mom's doing, but I guess she's doing the same."

Jazz was at a complete loss for words. She was silent for a while, until she finally found something to keep the conversation going. "Then, what are _you_ going to do?"

"Same as always," Danny said. "I've got a responsibility, and I just gotta stick with it, whether my parents know it or not."

"What about our new neighbors, the Comptons? They're pretty serious ghost hunters. What are going to do about them?"

"I don't know the answer to that one," Danny admitted. "You know, when I first met the Comptons and I found out they were ghost hunters, I thought that it was going to be brutal, having to keep my secret from _four_ ghost hunters now. But now that mom and dad know, that only leaves two ghost hunters to hide from. If anything, I'd like to think of it as a problem solved."

"Uh, okay," Jazz said. Clearly, both of them thought the situation was getting a little too weird and uncomfortable for their own good.

"So, I'll, uh…be seeing you later," Danny said, backing out of the doorway. Quietly, who closed Jazz's door and wiped a large amount of sweat off his forehead. "Well, that went tolerably well!" he said.

Danny started walking over to his room. He opened the door and plopped down on his own bed. He took a deep breath and didn't know what to do. A few seconds later, he felt a huge, fiery pain in his back.

"Gah!" Danny yelled, falling on to the ground. He let out a long, painful moan. He tried to get up, and after a while, he was finally on two legs again, despite the tremendous pain.

"Geez, it feels like someone just blasted me with my dad's Fenton Bazooka," Danny said in an almost joking way, trying to think of the one possible thing that could accurately say how much his back suddenly hurt. "Ahhh…"

Now Danny was confused. After a rather awkward way of breaking the news to Jazz that his parents knew, he got another random surge of pain. Where the heck were those pains coming from?


	7. Training

Danny's life seemed to be getting more and more back to normal. School the next day didn't seem to be so bad or as long as the previous few days had been. (Although he still found himself wanting to fall asleep in most of the classes he was in) But now, he was once again ready to pass through the halls and do his daily routine like always and not have to pay attention to do it at all.

When school ended, he was walking home, as always. He was able to relax a little more, now that he knew who the ghost was that was causing him all that trouble and that he would soon be getting his revenge on him. But he was also happy that his family knew about his secret, and he thought that would make his ghost hunting life much easier.

Danny was listening to the sounds of the birds chirping, the wind softly blowing and his feet tapping on the pavement as he walked home. He was feeling a lot better for some reason, even though there were going to be a lot of challenges that lay ahead of him.

When he was only a minute or so from his house, Danny's mouth opened and out popped a thin cloud of blue smoke. There was a ghost nearby, and he had to do something about it. He dropped his backpack to the ground as he morphed into his ghostly alter-ego.

After Danny had completely transformed, he looked around, searching for the ghost that just set off his ghost sense. Finally, he saw a stereotypical green blob pop up from under the sidewalk and get ready to attack him.

Danny actually smiled when he saw this ghost. "Hmmm, you look about as easy to beat up as a two year old in a wheelchair," he taunted.

The random ghost actually seemed to get a little upset by Danny's sarcastic remarks. It started firing up a ball of energy in his hand, and prepared to fire it at Danny. In just a second or two, the energy was released and headed right for him.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" shouted a familiar voice. Suddenly, something jumped right in front of Danny and took the blast for him.

"Aria?" Danny asked.

Indeed, Aria had just jumped right in front of Danny and took the blast so he wouldn't feel it. She moaned in pain for a few seconds, and while she was recovering from the blast, Danny fired two blasts from his hand back-to-back and scared the ghost away.

"Hey, you all right?" Danny asked, looking down at Aria. He bent down on one knee as he stared at Aria lying on the ground in a bit of pain.

"I'm fine," Aria said, breathing heavily. She looked up with Danny, acting like she was very badly hurt.

"Hold on, I gotcha," Danny moaned as he pulled Aria up from the ground.

"Thanks," Aria said with a smile on her face.

"Look, I'd love to stay and chat, but I got some homework to do, all right?" Danny asked. He ran over to his backpack and made him and his backpack go intangible, therefore invisible. He flew up into his house and into his room.

Once Danny was in his room, he changed back into his human form and started digging out all his books and worksheets that he had to work on. After a minute or so, he had started on his homework and took it seriously, but did a bit of rushing to finish it.

About thirty minutes later, Danny was done. He was alone in his room with no homework to do, and no ghosts to battle.

"Whew, this is nice!" Danny said, realizing that he had time to himself for once. He ran over to his Playstation and popped in _Call of Duty 2._ After blowing away a few enemies on the game, he was rudely interrupted.

He opened his mouth and another stream of blue mist poured from it. He went into his ghost form and prepared to brace himself for an upcoming attack. But, to his surprise, it wasn't a hostile ghost.

"Aria!" Danny yelled, staring at the window. "What are you doing here?"

Aria seemed disgusted. Her hair flowed as she took fast glances around the room, seemingly getting angrier and angrier at Danny with everything she saw.

"I ask for your help to bring Count Xissil Van Horrick to the ground, and I see you playing video games! Don't you care about the Ghost Zone?" she yelled.

_Uh, not really,_ Danny thought to himself. _It's that place that's giving me all the problems I have now._

"Um, of course I do!" Danny lied with a fake smile.

"Excellent," Aria said, folding her arms. "Well then, shall we get going?"

"Wait, where are we going?"

"Why, we're going to train, of course," Aria replied.

Danny really wasn't sure what Aria was getting at, but he decided to go with her, since she seemed to know what she was doing. She took Danny by the arm and flew them down into his basement. Once there, she instructed Danny to open up the Ghost Portal. Danny obeyed and pressed a series of buttons until the metal doors opened, revealing a swirling green circle capable of transporting someone to that other dimension.

Once inside, Aria turned around to look at Danny. "It's going to be a bit of a flight, so stay on your guard and pay attention."

"Wait, what do you mean 'a little bit of a flight'?" Danny asked.

"Well, we need to find somewhere where Van Horrick won't find us, won't we?" Aria said to Danny as if she expected to him to know it.

"Uh, yeah, I guess," Danny said, taking a quick glance away from Aria. "All right, did you have somewhere in mind?"

"As a matter of fact, I did!" Aria brightly said, smiling. She turned around and waved for Danny to follow her.

A short while later, Danny was following Aria down a seemingly endless path into the Ghost Zone. While Aria seemed to know perfectly well where she was going, Danny felt a little nervous about it. He felt like this route seemed familiar, and in a bad way. Still, Aria seemed fairly confident, and that was enough for him.

After what seemed like a very long time, Aria finally led Danny to a vacant area in the ghost zone that was occupied by absolutely nothing. There was just open space, and no one else was there besides Danny and Aria.

"All right," Aria said in clever-sounding voice, "let's see what you've got."

"Wait, you don't want me to fight you, do you?" Danny asked, his green eyes widening with confusion and concern at the same time.

"No," Aria calmly replied, with another small smile starting to spread across her pale face. "I merely want to see what special skills you have that you think can beat Van Horrick."

"But you've seen me fight!" Danny yelled, opening his hands at his side. "Don't you think that's enough?"

"No, I want to know what you can really do," Aria said. As she said this, a nervous expression crossed her face.

"Eh, all right?" Danny said in a questioning way, not really having anything to say that would disagree with her."

Danny immediately started showing her all of his moves, starting with simple things like firing ectoplasmic blasts of energy out of his hands.

"Impressive," Aria said, nodding her head as she watched Danny fire his energy. "Anything else you can do with that?"

"Well, I can charge them up into little balls and throw them," Danny said, not really thinking it was critical that Aria knew that.

"Anything else?"

"Well, I can duplicate myself," Danny said. He concentrated all of his energy and tried to split himself into two. After struggling with it for a while, a second copy of him from the midsection and up popped out of his side. "Check that: can _kind of_ duplicate myself," he moaned, allowing the failed duplicate to disappear in a puff of smoke.

"Is that all?"

"No, there's more. I can go intangible and invisible!" A smile spread across Danny's face while he said that.

While he continued showing Aria all of his basic moves, a few thoughts started creeping into his head. _There's something weird about this part of the Ghost Zone. I feel like I've been down here before, but not in this particular area. Yeah, it's isolated, but I get the feeling I'm not alone. I mean, besides Aria. What's so weird about this?_

"Are there any other special powers of yours?" Aria asked.

"Um…let me think," Danny said, trying to think of everything great he could do. "Oh yeah, I got one more! Watch out!"

Danny turned away from Aria, not wanting to hurt her. While he turned away, he took in a giant gulp of air and let it out. As he let it out, massive seismic waves started coming from his mouth while a stereotypical ghostly cry was heard throughout the ghost zone. The waves were so powerful that they had the capability of destroying buildings around him.

Aria seemed surprised and stunned by this, almost worried. She was breathless for a moment before finally speaking. "Wh…what was that?"

"That was my ghostly wail," Danny said proudly. "It gives me the ability to blow away anything that gets in my way."

Aria now seemed worried about it. It took a while before her being nervous subsided.

"Don't worry, I won't use it on you," Danny promised. "I only use it on ghosts that really push my buttons."

Aria smiled after she heard Danny say that. "All right, then," she said. "Well, I guess you were right and I was wrong. You _do_ seem to have the power to take on Van Horrick in a battle."

"Told ya I would!" Danny smiled, putting his hands on his hips. "Anything else you doubt about me?"

"No," Aria said, sounding as if she was actually embarrassed. "But you must remember: Count Xissil Van Horrick is still a very powerful ghost. Just because you have impressive powers does not mean Van Horrick will be a pushover.

"I know," Danny said. "Well, is that all?"

"Well, now I know what powers you have," Aria said, "but now I think you need to practice them."

"Practice them? What do you mean?"

"You need to train your powers and make them stronger for when you battle Van Horrick."

"Why?" Danny whined. "I'm stronger than any King of England wannabe."

"We're talking about a ghost that no one around has the courage to take on," Aria said sorrowfully.

_There are people around here?_, Danny asked himself as Aria told him that. _It didn't look like there were a lot of ghosts in this part of the Ghost Zone._

"Yeah, so?"

"So, he must be really strong if no one wants to confront him!" Aria yelled. She suddenly seemed to be getting annoyed. "Don't you think we should at least practice your skills a little more?"

"Uh, yeah, I guess," Danny said. He was really confused now, and anyone could tell it just by looking at him. He found it strange that he was in a completely abandoned area with a ghost he met only a few days before who insisted he should practice his moves and make himself stronger in order to fight a ghost he had never met before, and the ghost was just some snobby European sounding guy who physically looked like an upperclassmen in England during the middle ages but sounded more like a Transylvanian vampire. That all sounded weird when put together.

Danny started by charging up some of his energy and firing it. Aria said it seemed to be working and insisted that Danny go as fast as he could. After firing several blasts of energy, Danny found he was getting tired.

"All right, is there any point to this?" Danny yelled, starting to get annoyed with Aria. "Is there any reason you want me to waste all my energy firing at nothing!"

"I want to see how fast you can fire to see if you have what it takes to beat Van Horrick in speed!"

"But…"

"Come on, Danny!" Aria yelled, now with some distress in her voice. "We're talking about one of the nastiest people around here, and you could be the only one who has the power to stop him! Don't you think it's worth it to spend some extra time making sure you can take him!"

"I'm telling you, I could beat that old man with one hand tied behind my back!" Danny insisted.

"Well, we'll just have to see about that, won't we!" Aria yelled, sounding as angry and frustrated as Danny was. "Now keep practicing!"

Danny groaned, and continued doing his best to fire his strongest attacks in the shortest amounts of time possible.


	8. Getting Friendlier

Once again, I want to thank the people who have reviewed this story so far. Thank you two weirdIT and Leppers for reviewing this story, and my most recent reviewer, Hanyoucrazy411. Reviews give me motivation to write more and to keep going. (and thank you Leppers for reading _Descendant's Curse_) Please keep the reviews coming, they mean a lot to me!

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"Come on, keep at it!" Aria yelled as if she were an irritable High School gym coach. She insisted that Danny try his absolute hardest to make sure he was strong enough and was fast enough for when he would eventually take on Van Horrick and defeat him. Danny didn't see the point in this, but he didn't want to keep getting bugged by Aria, so he just went along with what she was commanding.

It seemed like hours before she even began to lighten up. Danny was getting pretty annoyed by Aria's attitude and felt he should say something sooner or later. After Aria forced him to go through vigorous work over and over again, he finally had enough.

"Look, why am I even listening to you!" Danny yelled. "Okay, I appreciate your help and all, but you don't have to treat me like you're some personal trainer trying to get me in shape to run the Boston Marathon!"

"But Danny," Aria whined, "we're talking about Count Xissil Van Horrick! He's…"

"I know," Danny moaned, interrupting her. "So powerful that no one wants to challenge him. But still, why are you putting me through this kind of work? Can't we call it a day?"

"Fine," Aria sighed. "You know, I think you might actually be strong enough now to take him on. When do you plan on fighting him?"

"I don't know!" Danny yelled. "I guess the next time he finds me...or I find him. Whichever comes first, I guess."

Aria had a very neutral expression on her face. "Hmmmm...all right, then. You can go home, now. Best of luck when you fight Van Horrick! You really seem like you're powerful enough to vanquish him!"

"All right," Danny said. "See ya!"

Danny turned his back on Aria and started flying through the Ghost Zone, but the flight back to his ghost portal was a long one. His entire body was aching after that torturous training session with Aria.

Danny watched as all the doors and random objects in the Ghost Zone floated by him as he continued to make his way back home. After the long flight, he finally saw the portal that would lead back into his basement.

The Ghost Boy went through the circular portal, and there was a bright flash. Less than a second later, he plopped down on the floor to his basement. He changed back into his human form and slowly limped his way up the stairs out of the basement. Once that walk was finished, he had yet another walk to make up the stairs to his room.

When Danny finally got to his room, he opened the door and slowly walked in. He looked at himself in the mirror to see if he physically looked any different. His face seemed a little red, and there were some dark circles under his eyes. His night-black hair looked a bit greasy from all the sweat.

"Ugh…" Danny groaned. He slowly walked over to his bed and sat down on it, but fell on it like he was a sack of bricks. His neck was killing him, and his arms were sore. His stomach also ached quite a bit. His legs were feeling like rubber. His entire body felt as if it had just undergone a long, excruciating workout.

"Man, I'm gonna sleep well tonight," Danny moaned to himself. He then fell backwards on his bed, only able to think about another morning tomorrow of having to wake up at 6:00. But then, a great thought came to him.

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled, sitting up in bed, only to feel a great amount of pain in his side and abdomen after doing so. "Gah…tomorrow's Saturday, isn't it? That's great, I can't wait to have tomorrow off. Maybe I'll finally be able to relax."

The rest of the night passed by uneventfully. Danny tried to relax, and he was finally able to get around to playing some video games and watching some good Friday night primetime television shows.

Danny fell asleep and slept like a rock. He was in such a deep level of sleep after the stressful week he had that it was almost like he had been knocked out by a blow from a professional boxer.

Danny slowly woke up the next morning, almost two hours later than he would normally wake up on a weekend. He slowly got up and showered, then got into his regular day clothes. He was feeling more cheerful than usual, but he was much quieter, especially around his parents. He didn't even call either of his friends to see how they were doing.

After a quick breakfast, Danny went back to his room to play some more video games. He popped in _Tales of Legendia _and immediately started playing. As he was played the game and listened to a character named Chloe talk, he heard the phone ring. No sooner did the phone ring, but Maddie was heard screaming, "I'll get it!"

Danny didn't pay any attention to it as he continued playing the game.

"_It's not a matter of interest. You know, you are extremely self-centered,"_ Chloe said to another character on screen.

"And _you_ know, you have a really bad voice actress," Danny replied in a snobby way to the game.

Just as Danny was about to hit a button to continue the game, Maddie stuck her head into Danny's bedroom door and screamed, "Danny! The phone's for you!"

Danny groaned and put the controller down on the ground, and then went over and took the portable phone out of his mom's hands. "Hello?"

"Ah, Danny," said the person on the other end. It was their new neighbor, Mr. Compton. "How are you doing on this fine Saturday morning?"

"Uh…great?" Danny said, feeling a little awkward. "What's up?"

"Well, you seemed like a fine young man when I met you for the first time earlier this week," Mr. Compton started.

"Thanks," Danny said, knowing that there had to be some catch to all of this. "Is that why you called?"

"No," Mr. Compton continued explaining, his voice seeming very calm. "Since you seem like such a nice boy, I thought it'd be nice to invite you over my house today so we could get to know each other a little better."

"Uh...I don't really know about that…" Danny said uneasily.

"Oh, come on," Mr. Compton insisted. "We're both ghost hunters, right? Maybe we could learn a thing or two from one another. What do you say?"

"_I'll bet that's what this is all about,"_ Danny thought to himself after he heard Mr. Compton make that last statement. "Hold on, let me ask my mom."

Danny put the phone down and looked at his mom. "Mom, Mr. Compton is inviting me over. Would it be okay if I went?"

"Of course it would!" Maddie said, getting very excited. "This would be a great opportunity for you to make friends with fellow ghost hunte…"

Maddie stopped in mid sentence and seemed like something was bothering her. Apparently, she just remembered the incident where Danny's secret was revealed earlier that week.

"…well, you'll make a new friend!" Maddie said, trying to recover.

"Mom, do I have to?"

"Yes! Tell Mr. Compton you'll be glad to come over and ask if he wants you to bring anything."

Danny groaned, then began talking back into the phone. "Yes, it's fine. Want me to bring anything over?"

"No, nothing except your ghost hunting knowledge," Mr. Compton said in his British accent.

"All right, I'll be over in a few minutes," Danny said. Groaning, he hit the hang up button and gave his mom an unhappy look.

But, it wasn't like he actually had much of a choice. In a matter of moments, he was out the door and walking across the street to the Comptons' house. He knocked on the wooden door and heard footsteps walking quickly towards it.

Mr. Compton opened the door and smiled down at Danny. "Danny, how good to see you! Come on in."

Danny nervously walked in, not taking his eyes off Mr. Compton. The house was a pretty large one with dirty wooden floors, and there was dark paint on the walls. He slowly walked around, taking in everything that was around him. The furniture definitely looked like it would belong in an upper class British home.

"So, how have you been?" Danny asked, trying to get a conversation going.

"Oh, I've been just fine," Mr. Compton said politely. "So, you want to see any of my cool ghost hunting gadgets?"

"Uh…sure," Danny said.

Mr. Compton took a key out of his pocket and opened a locked door. He opened it, and when they went in, it looked more like a torture chamber to Danny. The walls were lined with items with sharp spikes attached to them, as well as some things that looked like they could give electric shots and quite a few bazookas. There was even one giant ghost hunting suit in the corner of the room that looked really dangerous.

"So, what do you think?" Mr. Compton said, smiling. "Impressive, don't you think?"

"Um, yeah…" Danny nervously said, wanting to get out of the room as fast as possible. Right now, the entire house seemed freaky. It was almost like a haunted house, with the creaky floorboards and the dark, grim walls.

"So, would you happen to know anything about ghost hunting?" Mr. Compton asked. "I'm sure your parents must have rubbed some of their knowledge off on you."

"Uh…of course they did!" Danny said, not being able to stop stammering. "They, uh, taught me how to defend myself in case a ghost attacked!"

"Really?" Mr. Compton asked. "How do you defend yourself?"

"Well, there's this weapon called a Fenton Bazooka, and a Fenton Thermos that can trap ghosts in it! Yeah, that's where a lot of ghosts go once they get captured by us!"

Danny was trying to sound as natural as possible and as calm and cool as possible, but for some reason, he couldn't. He was nervous that something was going to go wrong, or that he was going to say something stupid and reveal himself as part ghost. His parents would still love him even if they found out his secret, but a ghost hunting neighbor was another story. Danny would _hate_ to think that Mr. Compton found out his secret.

"So, read any good books lately?" Danny asked nervously and abruptly, trying to change the subject. "I haven't, but I've sure seen some great movies! Have you seen Spider-man 2? Awesome movie, that was!"

Mr. Compton looked at Danny in a very confused way. "Are you all right, Danny? You seem a bit…uneasy."

"Uneasy?" Danny asked. He had a very fake smile on his face, and his nervous face gave away its insincerity. For some reason, he didn't feel comfortable at all talking to Mr. Compton about ghost hunting, especially since he didn't want Mr. Compton to know his secret.

"Yes. Do you want some water or something?" Mr. Compton politely offered, his neutral face looking a little worried.

"Water? Uh, sure. Thanks."

Mr. Compton went out into the kitchen and returned a minute later with a tall glass of tap water. He handed it to Danny, and Danny began taking a few sips of the lukewarm water. He swallowed hard, wanting to leave the house as quickly as possible.

"Hey, how about them Red Sox?" Danny asked. "Pretty good postseason in 2004, don't ya think?"

"I'm afraid I'm not familiar with your country's past time," Mr. Compton said with a low tone.

"Oh, great," Danny said. Just as he was trying to think of something to say, something popped out of his mouth: a puff of blue smoke. That meant that there had to be a ghost nearby.

"_No!" _Danny thought to himself. _"Not here, not now. Not in front of Mr. Compton…"_

"Is something wrong, Danny?" Mr. Compton asked, looking at Danny with a seemingly very concerned expression.

"Uh, I'll be right back, I just remembered something I gotta do outside!" Danny yelled. He bolted out of the door and ran behind to the back of Mr. Compton's house. He morphed into his ghost side and started flying through the air, looking for the ghost that had just triggered his senses. "Come out, wherever you are."

Danny flew around, looking for a while before he finally peeked around a corner and thought he saw the tail of a ghost fly behind _another_ corner of the house.

"Ah ha!" he yelled excited. "Now I got you!"

He flew over to the opposite corner that he saw the ghost fly behind and was ready to head it off. "All right, come out and face me!" Danny yelled.

Then Danny felt something hit him, and he was suddenly knocked unconscious. He fell on the ground, seeing nothing but black everywhere.

And that's exactly what he woke up to. Danny found himself slumped on the floor in some very dark room. The floor was cold, and it was made of stone, so it was very uncomfortable to be lying down on.

After a bit of groaning, Danny was able to lift himself off the ground. He looked around and saw that the entire room was dark with stone walls and floors. There was a window, and looking through it to see where he was now was the first thing Danny did. What he saw came as shock.

He was no longer in the real world, but now he was in the ghost zone. He got an eyeful of a purple abyss with swirling green parts in it, but there were no random items floating around in it, almost like a completely isolated place.

"Wait a minute! There's only one place I can think of in the ghost zone that is isolated like this!" Danny exclaimed breathlessly when he realized there was nothing floating around. "I can't be…am I actually _inside_ Count Xissil Van Horrick's mansion?"


	9. A Turning Point

Danny was trying to make sure he understood everything correctly. He had just been knocked unconscious somehow after visiting Mr. Compton when a ghost suddenly came out of nowhere and attacked. Now that he woke up, Danny thought he was standing in the mansion of Count Xissil Van Horrick.

The giant room he was in looked very empty and lifeless. The floors were solid marble, and the walls were made of some very strong concrete. The room itself had no light coming from it, but there was enough light from outside to illuminate the inside of the room. There was nothing really spectacular about the room, since there was no furniture in it.

When looking out the window, Danny saw that there was absolutely nothing around him in the ghost zone. The building he was in was truly just something sticking out in the middle of nowhere. Completely empty and creepy rooms, in a random building a long way from anything else in the ghost zone-it was definitely Horrick's mansion.

"Sheesh, I gotta get out of here!" Danny said to himself when he was able to move around again. He bolted towards the door leading out of the room and opened it. But, to his unpleasant surprise, there were several doors along the side walls, and the corridor only led to a dead end. With over ten doors to choose from, Danny had no idea which one he should go through.

The hardest part was that Danny was positive that even if he chose the correct door that would lead him to the front of the house, there was probably going to be an entirely new set of doors, and he'd have to try his luck again to get through those ones.

For the longest time, all Danny could hear was the sound of him running through the empty hall, opening up the doors and slamming them shut. His heavy breathing also echoed off the empty walls, but he didn't have to hear his footsteps echoing due to the fact the floor he was running on was carpeted and was absorbing the sound.

Danny kept opening door after door, only to get frustrated to find he was somewhere like a broom closet or in _another_ winding hallway.

"Come on, what does that Horrick guy need all these rooms for, anyway!" Danny yelled. "He can't settle for just a bedroom and a bathroom like I have to?"

Danny continued running down the seemingly endless hallways, looking for the way out of this monster of a house. Running through all the long, twisting hallways was just like trying to run through a maze. And right now, maze running was _not_ something Danny had any interest in doing.

Finally, Danny found a room that led into another huge room, but in the center of one of the walls to the big room was a giant door. There was a window next to the door and Danny saw that right outside the window was a clear view of the ghost zone. That giant door was actually the way out!

Danny was happy at first, but then he saw a very disturbing sight that ruined his happy mood. Standing in that massive room with the only door to escape was Count Xissil Van Horrick, the ghost that was giving Danny a lot of trouble the past week.

But the disturbing surprises didn't end there. Once he saw Van Horrick was there, he turned to the side and saw that Aria was standing there.

"Aria!" Danny yelled. "But…"

Still, the shocks didn't end there. Danny saw a _third_ figure in the room, and this one brought the greatest shock of them all.

"…Mr. Compton?" Danny asked, not believing what his eyes were telling him.

Yes, Danny's new neighbor, Mr. Compton, was standing there. His neutral face now had a glimpse of evil in it that Danny had never noticed before. In fact, _all three_ of them were staring at Danny with the same evil glare. It was then Danny knew that the three of them were in on something that he wasn't supposed to know about, and clearly didn't.

"What's going on!" Danny yelled, passing all three of them furious glances. "Aria! Mr. Compton! What are you doing with this guy?"

"Oh, please," Horrick said in a cocky tone. "You honestly can't tell me you haven't caught on? Oh, and I thought you were telling me how great you were."

"I…" was the only thing Danny could say. He knew that there was obviously something going on, and he was going to find out what.

"All three of you were in on this," Danny hissed, talking to them as if they were employees of his who he was about to fire. "Why! What is it that you want with me!"

"It's very simple," Horrick said, his grim face turning into a hideous sneer. "I need to sever the link between you and me."

"Sever the link?" Danny asked, not knowing what that meant. He then quickly passed his attention towards Mr. Compton. "And what do you think _you're_ doing!"

"Heh. You really thought you could fool me?" Mr. Compton asked. "I'm actually pretty disappointed, Danny. I thought you would have enough common sense to not go from your human half to your ghost half in broad daylight on a public street."

"You…what?" Danny asked, still confused.

"Remember the first time you met me?" Aria said. Her voice no longer seemed sweet and innocent, but more wicked and deceptive. Her sad expression now looked like she was about to see someone she hated about to go into a torture chamber. "When you transformed in plain sight?"

"Yes, I was watching," Mr. Compton said. "How fortunate for me to have been looking out the window at that exact moment!"

Danny didn't know what to say. Aria was obviously deceiving him from the start, and Mr. Compton had known for the past few days that Danny was part ghost. But Horrick's role in all of this, though, was still unknown.

"Perhaps you don't understand," Horrick said. "I have been trying to look for you for the past week or so. I insisted on asking _everybody_ on your street and on other roads if they had any information on Danny Phantom's whereabouts. Lo and behold, I stumble across your good neighbor, Mr. Compton."

Compton just began smiling at the remark, but still kept the insane look on his face.

"I am so confused!" Danny yelled. "Why were you looking for me, anyway?"

"You know, Danny," Compton said, clasping his dry, starting-to-wrinkle hands together, "the very night I saw you turn into your ghost half when you first met Aria, this Van Horrick fellow came to my house and demanded information on where he could find you."

"And you _told him!"_ Danny raged. "Aren't neighbors supposed to look after one another! You know, you are the exact _opposite_ of a Mr. Rogers-type neighbor!"

"Calm down, Danny," Compton said, still keeping the sneer on his face. "I told him I knew about someone with your powers, but I refused to tell him who it was at first. But then he threatened to kill me, so I told him."

Now that Danny knew Horrick had made a death threat to Compton if he refused to give away information about Danny being the Ghost Boy, he had a bit more mercy for him. But, that feeling soon went away.

"Hold on a second!" Danny yelled, looking at Compton. "You _knew_ this would happen, didn't you! You knew Horrick or Aria would come looking for me, so you invited me over your house to let my guard down!"

"My, aren't you smart," Aria said, sounding more and more evil with each word that came passed her lips. "That ghost that set off your ghost sense…was me. I fired a blast of energy at the back of your head to knock you out cold."

"And you knew she was going to be here?" Danny yelled, looking at Compton. "You didn't want to talk about ghost hunting or getting to know me when you invited me over your house! You wanted me over so you could get my guard down and to make sure my parents didn't interfere! You set me up!"

Danny couldn't believe it. Mr. Compton had willingly let Aria and Horrick take him hostage, even though there didn't seem to be any threats made that time. It was a terrible thought for Danny, knowing that his neighbor not only gave away his deepest, darkest secret to a ghost, but then helped them capture him to do whatever they wanted with him.

It all seemed complex to Danny, but at the same time, so obvious. Aria was looking for Danny (for some unknown reason), and found him just on the streets. At that exact same moment, Compton had been looking out his window and saw Danny morph into his ghost form the first time he met Aria. Compton later used that information to save himself when Horrick came barging into his house that same night to demand any information Compton had about who the Ghost Boy was. And then Mr. Compton invited Danny over his house to make it easier to catch him without anyone interfering while at the same time keeping his guard low.

_Why_ Horrick wanted to capture Danny so much was still unknown, though.

Now, all three of Danny's new enemies were beginning to chuckle, and Danny was just getting more and more angry. When Aria, Compton and Horrick saw that they were making Danny angry, they only insisted on pushing his patience even further. Danny had enough of it and put both of his fists out in front of him like he was sparring. His two fists ignited into deep balls of green fire and ectoplasma.

"Oh, what might this be?" Aria asked, slightly surprised.

"Are you going to teach me a lesson?" Horrick asked in baby-talk, doing his best to make Danny as irritated as possible. "You want to fight big, bad me?"

"You know what I'm gonna do!" Danny yelled. "You all are in this together, so I'm taking all three of you on, right here and now!"

All three of Danny's new foes had surprised looks on their face. They weren't expecting Danny to actually want to battle the three of them simultaneously, especially since he was probably stronger than all of them.

Danny started by running over to Compton and giving him to quick punches in the face, and then a solid bash right between the eyes. Mr. Compton fell backwards on the ground. He looked like a rag doll and was lying completely motionless, no signs of breathing at all.

"If there's one thing I learned from all the bosses I've battled in video games, it's that you _always_ take out the weaker ones first so there aren't any distractions," Danny said.

He turned his attention back towards Aria and Horrick. Both of them were clearly worried, especially when Danny started charging up a blast of energy in his hand and kept changing his mind about whether or not he was going to fire it at Horrick or Aria.

Danny finally stopped and fired a blast at Van Horrick. Horrick screamed in pain as the heavy blast knocked him to the ground. Danny then sprung up in the air and landed himself on top of Horrick as he lay on the ground.

Danny began punching Horrick several times in the face, leaving the ghost with no option but to lie there helplessly and take as many hits as Danny wanted to give him. Finally, Danny jumped into the air and fired a blast right at Horrick's head. Danny landed on the ground and saw Horrick now lying motionless, just like Compton.

He turned his attention away from Horrick quickly and was now staring at Aria. She had a terrified look on her face as Danny started walking towards her faster and faster, fury lighting up his green eyes.

"So, are you going to let me pummel you like those other two did, or are you actually going to put up a fight?" Danny asked aggressively as he continued to walk towards her.

Aria's terrified expression only got more obvious as Danny kept walking towards her, knowing that he wanted nothing more than to tear her limb from limb.

But without warning, Aria fired a blast of energy at Danny and hit him in the chest. Danny got knocked back, and Aria started floating into the air, ready to make a series of attacks that she hoped would drop Danny's guard.

Unfortunately for her, Danny was a step ahead. He instead charged up into the air and rammed his fist into her as hard as she could. She screaming in pain as she fell to the ground, completely defenseless.

As she collapsed onto the ground, Danny flew down and put his foot on her back, making sure she didn't move.

"I'm the angriest with _you_ out of the three of ya," Danny said in a voice that was angry, but happy at the same time. "Why'd you have to betray me like that? I know I'm not supposed to hit a girl, but come on, what you did to me was just plain nasty!"

Sneering, Danny walked away from the barely conscious Aria and went to the middle of the room. He looked around and saw Mr. Compton still slumped like a rag doll and Horrick lying back flat on the ground, looking like he just had a giant rock smashed over his face.

It was at that moment Danny started laughing. He had done it. He won. He beat all three of them.


	10. The Shocking Truth

Before I start, here's a bit of an update. I don't know if any of you looked at my profile, but if you have, then you'd know it was completely blank. Well, for the first time in ever, I put stuff in there. So, if you want to take a look at it, please do.

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It was a good feeling for Danny. The room was dark and cold, there was heavy breathing to be heard, and there were three defeated bodies on the floor. But to Danny, it was actually a quite pleasant feeling. The three bodies were enemies that he had just defeated: Count Xissil Van Horrick, Mr. Compton, and the traitor, Aria. (but that's not to say Compton wasn't a traitor, either)

As Danny stared and regained himself after giving the three a quick beating, he just snickered. "Hmm, that was enjoyable."

He went over to the massive door and began to open it so he could get out of the Ghost Zone and Horrick's mansion, ready to forget about the entire thing. But just as he touched the doorknob, he got smacked in the back of neck with someone's elbow.

"Gah!" he screamed in pain as he plummeted on the ground. He looked over his shoulder and saw Horrick staring down at him, looking nastier than Danny ever remembered him looking.

"Foolish ghost child," Horrick said, now sounding completely serious and deathly instead of snobby. "Did you think for once that there could possibly be a reason I was out looking for you?"

"I don't know, I didn't think you were smart enough to think things out to step two," Danny replied, still lying on the ground, unable to get up.

Horrick chuckled. Danny saw that behind him Compton and Aria also got up. They stared at him with a savage gaze that struck fear into Danny's heart.

"You really are quite an amusing little boy," Horrick taunted. He looked around and pointed his attention at Aria. "Aria, help me carry this boy into the dungeon."

"Right away," Aria said. She walked over to Danny and grabbed him by the ankles, and then lifted him up. Horrick took a hold of Danny's wrists, and the two lifted him off the ground. Danny struggled to break free, but it was no use.

Danny was completely helpless as Aria and Horrick carried him away. After trying and failing to break free, there was nothing he could do now that would help him escape. He only listened to the footsteps loudly clanking off the blank walls in Horrick's mansion as he was taken down the seemingly endless hallways and corridors. The entire room was silent, aside from the sound of the echoing steps.

It wasn't until Danny had been captured and taken off for a few seconds that he realized Compton was also following them to wherever he was being taken. It wasn't long before Danny found out.

"Compton!" Aria yelled. "Open the door for us."

Danny looked ahead and saw he had been carried to a giant door. What was behind the door, he didn't know.

Compton jumped to the front and opened up the large door. It made a large creaking sound, and Danny lifted his head up to see what was inside the room. All he saw was a giant metal table with some painful-looking instruments around it.

"Lay him down on the table!" Horrick yelled.

In just a few seconds, Danny had been slammed down onto the solid metal table in the center of the room. It hurt his back as he was slammed onto it, but that was the least of his worries, he thought. When he was slammed on the table, Aria and Compton put straps on his hands and feet so he couldn't get out. Before he realized what had happened, he was strapped down onto the metal table with no hope of getting out.

For a while, the entire room was silent. Danny just looked at Compton, Horrick and Aria's faces as he gave grunts for breath. There was nothing he hated more than being beaten after he thought he had won.

Horrick was the first one to break the silence. "Compton, leave us."

Compton obeyed. He opened up the large door that led into the room and walked out, closing it tightly behind him. Aria and Horrick stared at him as he shut the door. When the door was completely closed and the loud sound it made finished ringing through their ears, they turned their attention back to Danny.

Horrick stared at Danny and started pacing around the room, giving Danny a cold look as he circulated the area. Danny could only follow Horrick with his eyes. After Horrick had made one complete circle around the room, he stopped in front of Danny.

"So, Ghost Child, do you know _why_ I wanted others to capture you?" he asked.

"Because you wanted revenge for me beating you the first time we met?" Danny asked.

"No. Then, I was just another one of your casual nuisances. I wanted nothing more to do with you once you beat me a couple days ago."

"Then why are you still bugging me?"

"Do I have to explain everything!" Horrick yelled loudly, beginning to circle around the room once again. "Why don't you use your own head for once! Don't you remember what happened the night you fought me for the second time?"

"Uh, my parents found out I…" Danny started, but abruptly cut himself off in speech. He didn't want Horrick to know that his parents knew he was half-ghost, or he risked putting them in danger if Horrick were to escape. He stopped and said, "No, not really."

"Didn't you get zapped by anything?" Horrick asked, trying his best to get Danny to recall the events that occurred that night. "Like an electric ray or something similar?"

Danny gasped. He suddenly got a flashback to the night when his dad tried deactivating the Fenton portal. If Danny remembered, his dad made a mistake that caused some sort of electric current to flow into him. The last thing Danny remembered about that event was that he was knocked unconscious.

"How do you know about that?" Danny asked, now getting very disturbed with Horrick knowing about that incident.

"The same thing happened to me," Horrick replied coolly, still not taking his fixed eyes off Danny. "And now, I'm going to sever the link between us."

"Sever the link?" Danny asked. He had now gotten to ignore the cold feeling of the metal table he was laying on top of after getting involved in this discussion. "What the heck do you mean by that?"

Horrick got angrier and angrier, thinking Danny should know what he was talking about. "Weren't you feeling random pains over the course of this week?"

Danny froze up even more. He felt as if he had tabs being kept on him from ghosts everywhere. "Yes. I did."

"And surely you know _why_?"

"Uh…not really," Danny said, trying to be as casual as possible.

Horrick looked like he was ready to slam his head into the wall from frustration, but Aria was able to keep him under control somehow. "That current of electricity that went into you and electrocuted you…also electrocuted _me_."

"How?" Danny asked.

"Don't ask me how!" Horrick yelled. "Luck of the draw, I guess. That electric ray bounced off you and phased through your family's portal and into the Ghost Zone, did it not?"

"If I remember correctly, it did," Danny said, trying his best to follow what Horrick was getting at. Horrick's cape flew gently in the breeze it created as he casually strolled through the room.

"Well, when that ray bounced off you after going into your body, it went through the ghost portal and connected to another ghost. That ghost was _me_."

"Don't complain. You deserved it," Danny scuffed. "I'm glad that of all ghosts in the ghost zone that it was you who got zapped by the ray that connected to my body, because you have been a pain in the you-know-what this week."

"You shouldn't be," Horrick said. "You see, if it _didn't_ connect to me, then I would have left you alone. But now that I know it connected to you, I had to keep hunting you down."

"You realize you're making about as much sense as a monologue in a Shakespeare play, right?" Danny said.

"Bottom line, Ghost Child," Horrick said, finally picking up the pace, "is that when the electric ray connected you and me, whatever one felt, the other felt. Get it?"

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled. "Are you saying that all those weird pains I've been getting in my back and stuff have been because of _you_?"

"Yes," Horrick said, stopping in mid stride. "Whatever you felt, I felt; whatever I felt, you felt. That's why I'm bringing you here, to sever the link between us so we don't have to be feeling each other's pains."

"Really? Wow, thanks for taking the trouble to do it," Danny said excitedly, knowing he wouldn't be feeling those pains too much longer.

"Wait a minute, before you thank me, I should probably let you know I'm going to rip out your ghost half and then kill you after it's done," Horrick said, passing Danny an evil stare.

"Hey! If you're gonna kill me, why aren't you doing it now?" Danny challenged.

"We're still connected. If you died, then I would die, too."

Danny groaned, but he tried to recall everything Horrick had just said. When he was trying to convince Jack not to give up his ghost hunting-ways, Jack messed up when closing the Fenton Portal and sent an electric current from the portal into Danny's body and to some location in the Ghost Zone at the same time. By sheer coincidence, the electric current hit Horrick, the very ghost that had bugged Danny the same night Danny's parents figured out he was a ghost. Because of the current zapping both of them, the two were now inexplicably linked. Whatever Danny felt, Horrick also felt, and vice versa. Horrick was trying to track down Danny so he could break the link between them, and then kill him. Once Danny's ghost half was extracted from his body, Horrick would use it to enhance his own strength, and then kill Danny. The entire thing seemed needlessly drawn out and complicated.

Danny suddenly got the urge to make Horrick absolutely furious. He looked at Horrick and yelled, "Hey, are we really connected? Prove it!"

Horrick snarled, but then reached into his long, dark cloak and pulled out a sharp knife. He looked at Danny with a malicious stare.

"Tell me how this feels," Horrick said, forming a half-smile. In one swift motion, Horrick made a deep slice in his own arm with the knife. The cut was so fine and deep that you could clearly see his ghostly blood flowing through his veins.

Danny screamed in pain, almost like the exact same thing happened to him. He too felt like his arm had just been sliced open with a razor-sharp knife. Horrick tried regaining himself from the terrible pain of the knife, but soon got his grip back. (much to Aria's relief)

There was no mistaking it; Danny and Horrick were definitely feeling what the other felt.

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled. "How does Aria play into all this?"

"One of the first times I saw you, if you remember, you were battling a ghost," Aria said to Danny. "And I was hiding around and fired a blast that hit your wrist. I insisted it was an accident, but really, I was asking Horrick if he felt the blast in his wrist as well."

"And indeed I did," Horrick said.

Danny grit his teeth, not wanting to hear the rest of Aria's story. Unfortunately for him, he knew he'd have to hear it.

"It was then we were both sure that you and Horrick felt the same things," Aria said in her calm, cool way. Her voice sounded seducing and evil.

"But wait!" Danny yelled. "Another time when I was fighting a ghost, you jumped out and took the hit _for_ me!"

"Of course," Aria said, smiling. "I wouldn't want Horrick to feel any pain, so I did the thing anyone in my shoes would do: I jumped in front of you so _you_ wouldn't feel any pain so _Horrick_ wouldn't feel any pain. It's quite simple, really."

Danny was now annoyed that Aria had been deceiving him all along and had reasons for taking hits for him. "Suck-up," he muttered to her.

"Don't call my sweetie a suck-up!" Horrick yelled.

"Your sweetie?" Danny asked, looking at Aria and Horrick. This was pretty weird, considering Horrick was older and Aria was still very young-looking. "Oh, I get it, you guys are going out with one another. Horrick, I'd better warn ya: she doesn't _really_ love you. She's just going out with you so you write her into your will and give her this mansion when you die."

"Going out?" Horrick asked. "No, Horrick is my _daughter._"

Danny's heart started pounding faster and faster. Aria was Horrick's daughter? There was something he didn't see coming. Now he was even more enraged with how much Aria had been deceiving him. This entire time she was merely seeing if Danny and Horrick really felt the same thing, and any time she was fighting for Danny, it was really so Horrick wouldn't end up getting hurt.

Now Danny had everything pieced together. The first time Danny and Aria met, she _purposely_ blasted Danny in the wrist (even though she said it was an accident) to see if Horrick felt it, and he did. From then on, she made sure Danny didn't get hurt so Horrick wouldn't end up getting hurt. And she, too, was leading Danny into a trap to get captured in Horrick's mansion.

"In other words," Horrick said, walking over to a switch in the corner of the room. (Danny assumed the switch was connected to the machine he was hooked up to on the metal table) "After I sever the link between you and me, we will no longer feel the same pain. After that is done, I am going to rip your ghost half out of you and put it into me, therefore enhancing my strength. Finally, I'm going to kill you when we're no longer connected and I have all your powers."

Danny gasped. This was definitely not how he wanted his life to end. His heart rate and his breathing increased in pace rapidly as Horrick put his hand on the switch and was prepared to flip it.

"Well then," Horrick said emotionlessly, "shall we begin?"

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Sorry if that chapter was too complex, a lot of information was passed around in it. If you don't understand something, please ask me in a review and I'll try to clear it up at the beginning of the next chapter. Right now, you should know:

Why Danny was feeling those random pains

Why Aria was deceiving Danny and how (not to mention being Horrick's daughter)

That Horrick is hooking up Danny to the machine in order to break the connection between the two so they will no longer feel the same pain

What Horrick plans to do with Danny after the link between them is severed, and why he wants to do it.

How Danny and Horrick were connected and felt the same pain


	11. Aria's Battle

Danny nervously watched as Horrick continued to keep his hand on the switch. The room they were in was a large, circular one with the large metal table in the center of the room. It looked more like Danny was about to have surgery done on him. He was beginning to sweat from nervousness, and his white hair looked like it was getting pretty greasy from it.

Finally, the time came. Horrick pushed the switch upwards, and the large machine around Danny jolted into action. (literally) Sparks started flaying everywhere, and long beams of electricity shot themselves inside Danny and started traveling up and down his veins.

Danny began screaming in agonizing pain as the electricity currents sailed through his body. The process went on for a very long time, and Horrick would not stop grinning as Danny screamed for him to turn the machine off.

After what seemed like the longest time, Danny felt like something inside of him snapped. At the same time, Horrick shut the machine off and looked at Aria.

"Aria!" Horrick yelled to his daughter, "get the metal pole over in the corner and hit this child on the leg with it."

"Why?" Aria questioned.

"If he gets hit by the pole and I don't feel any pain, then the link is officially severed and we will be able to destroy him anyway we want to."

"Yes, father," Aria quietly said. She passed a look down to Danny that shoved the fact that he was going to die soon right in his face.

Danny's eyes widened and his teeth mashed together as he saw Aria walk away and come back with a long, metal pole in her hands. She raised it above her head and was prepared to whack him in the leg with it. (the point being that just in case the link between Danny and Horrick _wasn't_ severed, Horrick wouldn't feel too much pain)

Danny's eyes squeezed shut as the pole smashed his kneecap with much more force than he expected. Once again, he yelped out with agony in his voice. It was soon taken over by the sound of Horrick chuckling.

"That's it," Horrick said with a smile on his face. "The link has officially been severed. Now, we can kill that ghost child for everything he's put me through, and we won't have to worry about it killing me in the process!"

"Dude, I think you have it backwards," Danny said, lifting his head up from the table.

Horrick looked at the floor and continued to quietly laugh. He walked around the room as he laughed, but continued staring down at the floor. Aria was watching with a smile on her face as her father walked around the room. After a moment or two, Horrick stopped and pulled something out from a corner of the room. When it was out of the shadows, Danny saw that it was the knife Horrick had used to slice his arm open just a few minutes before to prove to Danny that they were indeed connected. (Danny had a hard time taking his eyes off the huge gash that was in Horrick's arm, considering the fact that the wound seemed so deep that it seemed anything could just get right in the injury)

Horrick kept the evil look on his face, and now he was right in front of Danny as he held the knife right over Danny's heart.

"Now, Ghost Child, you will die," Horrick said heartlessly.

He raised the blade high into the air, and was ready to thrust it into Danny's body with as much force as he could. But at the last minute, Danny screamed so loudly it made Horrick and Aria jump. As soon as he let out the loudest yell he had ever made, Danny used all his inner body strength to break free of the binds on the metal table. He was now floating in the air, just a few feet below the ceiling.

Horrick looked clearly upset that Danny escaped, but he didn't think it was a big deal that Danny got away. After all, he could just capture him again.

"Such a pity all of your strength won't matter in a little while," Horrick said to Danny. He then walked towards the door and quickly opened it, as if he were in a hurry to get somewhere. Just as he walked out, he yelled to Aria, "Aria! Stay here and fight him! You should know all his moves from your little 'training session', anyway."

Aria smiled and nodded her head, and then Horrick slammed the door. Now Aria and Danny had been engaged in a fight, and neither one of them showed any sign of backing down.

"Try and surprise me!" Aria challenged. "I know your every move!"

Danny was pretty angry now, due to the fact that her "training" was really just a way to figure out Danny's moves and to alert Horrick of how they were used in case he ever had to battle.

Danny launched up into the air and started forming two balls of energy, one in both of his hands. He threw both of them like a baseball, but Aria put up a ghostly shield and deflected them all.

"Ha!" she yelled. She then countered by flying up into the air with Danny and giving him fast, and surprisingly strong kicks to the jaw. After just a few kicks, Danny was knocked to the ground.

When he was still trying to get up after hitting the solid floor, Aria jumped down right in front of him and ran to a corner of the room. She picked up a giant mace and started walking towards Danny with it.

Danny actually screamed as he saw Aria charge towards him with the mace in her hand. The sharp spikes sticking out from the heavy head of the mace was enough to strike fear in his heart, but he had to ignore it the best he could. Just as Aria took a swing at him, he rolled out of the way.

Aria ended up sticking the mace into the floor, but she only had to give it a bit of a tug before she pulled it out again. When Aria had a firm grip on the mace, she again tried to crush Danny with it. And also like last time, Danny rolled out of the way.

But instead of continuing to stay on the ground, Danny got up this time. He kicked himself off the ground and was back on his feet. But he did it quickly so Aria wouldn't have any time to react to it. He shot a blast of ectoplasmic energy at her head, and she dropped the mace only an inch or two away from her foot.

As Aria was recovering from the surprise blast, Danny jumped over and grabbed the mace. He put it on the highest shelf in the entire room, saying "This thing is just an accident waiting to happen".

Now that he and Aria were back to fighting with just powers and their fists, the fight seemed to be getting much rougher.

After fighting for a while, Danny and Aria were relatively out of breath and were floating a few feet apart.

"You know, you're the worst daddy's girl I've ever seen," Danny remarked, trying his best to make her angry.

Aria responded to this by firing a blast of energy at Danny. Danny did a somersault in mid air and just barely missed it.

"Okay, whatever," Danny mumbled. He tried firing a blast at her, but she fired one at exactly the same time and collided in mid air, completely destroying both of them.

"You don't seem to be giving in," Aria said. "I guess I'll have to try a few more drastic things."

Aria put out her hands and pointed them at the ground. Instantly a mini-earthquake erupted through the tile flooring and traveled until it hit another wall. The process involved it hitting Danny, and he fell backwards as if someone had tripped him from behind.

Danny collapsed on the ground, and once again Aria got ready to create another small earthquake. But just as she created one, Danny jumped up into the air and started floating, and landed right in front of one of the shelves in the room.

"You're dead!" Aria yelled. As she was making a third earthquake, Danny fired a blast at her leg and she got knocked to the ground. She fell back-flat, but not before she completed the move that would create an earthquake.

Danny made sure he stayed up in the air as the third earthquake happened. But, Aria was in such a close proximity to the shelf she was standing in front of, the waves started shaking the shelf very quickly.

Then, a rattling sound was heard. It sounded like something metal was bouncing on the top of the shelf. Then Danny remembered that was where he put the mace.

The rumbling got louder, and Danny looked at the top of the shelf. It was indeed the same shelf where he put the mace. Eventually, the vibrations caused the mace to get knocked off the shelf and come tumbling towards the ground below.

The only problem was that Aria was at the foot of the shelf. When the mace came off the top ledge of the shelf, her face was right under it.

Danny's eyes widened in disbelief, unable to think about what was about to happen. Aria let out one last loud, bloodcurdling scream before the mace landed on top of her head. Ghostly green liquid burst from Aria's head as the mace came into contact with her. She didn't move at all after that.

Danny just stared, awestruck about actually seeing something that looked human just die. He didn't move at all for a few seconds, almost looking like a statue. Finally, he made a break for it and ran towards the door out of the room and tried to find the massive doors leading out of the house.

"I am SO outta here!" Danny yelled as he ran out of the room and slammed the door behind him.

He bolted down the long hallways and looked for a way out, looking more frantic than if a bomb was placed in the mansion. After running for a while and hearing nothing except the thudding of his footsteps as he ran through the carpeted, empty halls, he finally found someone.

"Mr. Compton!" Danny yelled.

Compton looked shocked to see Danny was alive. Danny landed right next to him and put his hands on his hips, trying to give Compton the most intimidating glare he could put on.

"But…but Horrick told me he gave Aria the strictest orders to kill you!" Compton yelled, his voice beginning to sound very desperate. He sounded like he was a criminal who was just caught on _America's Most Wanted_.

"Why don't you go find her and ask her to give you all the gory details of the fight?" Danny suggested. He then grabbed Compton by the back of his shirt and pulled him back to the room Danny was just in. (not without having to look for the room for a few minutes)

After Danny found the room he was held hostage in a few minutes earlier, he took some of the rope from the room and tied Compton up with it. After tying Compton's hands and feet up, he flew him back to the front entrance to the mansion.

"What are you going to do to me?" Compton asked. "I'm your neighbor. Surely you wouldn't kill me?"

"Nah, I'm not like you," Danny retorted. "But don't think I won't just drop you into some jail cell or padded-white cell, because I think you need some time alone, away from ghosts."

But instead of actually flying out, Danny put the tied up Compton down onto the ground and started running away.

"All right," Danny said when Compton was out of his sight. "Aria's dead, and I just forced Compton to surrender. All I need to do is find Horrick and finish him off!"


	12. Painful Farewells

With Aria dead and Compton tied up, all Danny had left to do was to find Horrick and battle him. Once Horrick was beaten, Danny would finally be able to get on with his life, knowing that he gave three creeps exactly what they deserved. (Except for Aria, he didn't think she deserved the painful ending she had to suffer)

After running through the seemingly endless hallways for a while, Danny found Horrick in a room. The room was full of dangerous and toxic chemicals, as well as a few gas hoses and valves. Heaters were lining the sides of the room.

"Hey Horrick, where did you pick up your guards, at the 99 cent store?" Danny screamed as he burst in. "Compton just got beaten by me in two seconds-flat!"

"What?...but, I told Aria to kill you!" Compton yelled.

Danny's irritated and angry face immediately changed to one of sorrow and pity. "Horrick, I'm not even kidding. I seriously _hate_ to tell you this, but your daughter's dead."

Horrick started laughing at the remark, but Danny kept the serious look on his face. "I'm serious! She and I were fighting, and she tried to crush me with a mace! Just so she wouldn't, I put the mace on a top shelf and she had some earthquake move that caused the mace to fall off the shelf and smash her head!" He sounded really distraught as he explained this, even if it was to his enemy.

"Stop lying!" Horrick said, now seeing that Danny might be telling the truth. "My Aria wouldn't fall to someone like you!"

"She did!" Danny yelled, trying to convince Horrick he wasn't lying.

Horrick looked like he was ready to burst. Finally, he just screamed loudly and full of fury as he pounced on Danny and began kicking the snot out of him. Danny was stuck on his back as Horrick started firing heavy punches into Danny's face. "Liar!" Horrick yelled as he continued to attack.

Once Danny had been beaten up enough, Horrick jumped off of him and ran in the direction of the room where he had ordered Aria to kill Danny. Danny got up after moaning for a while and tried running after him, doing his best not to let the pain in his mouth distract him.

About half way down the hall, Danny stopped when he heard Horrick scream, "ARRRRRIIIIIIIIIAAAAAAAA!" from a room a while away. Danny froze up when he heard the scream, now that he knew Horrick had seen his daughter's unfortunate fate during the fight between them.

A second later, Horrick flew out so fast it was as if he just popped up out of nowhere. He was in front of Danny and grabbed him by the front of the jumpsuit and kept as solid of a grip on him as he could.

"You murderer!" Horrick yelled, looking now like a deranged serial killer in a horror movie. His once calm face was now bursting with fury and showed no mercy.

"I told you, it was an accident!" Danny yelled, still with a sorry look on his face as he struggled to free from Horrick's steel grip.

"No, me reaching down and pulling out your throat…THAT'S the accident!" Horrick yelled.

Danny wasn't sure he had ever seen someone get as angry as Horrick was now. Just as Horrick was about to smash Danny against a wall with the intent to snap his neck, Danny made a sharp fly upwards that Horrick wasn't expecting. The end result was Horrick letting go and Danny getting free.

"Dude, I can understand you being angry," Danny yelled, "but you gotta understand that I'd never actually want to kill someone."

"I don't listen to cold blooded people like you!" Horrick yelled. He fired a blast of ectoplasmic energy at Danny, but Danny dodged it at the last second. The blast instead hit the ceiling and created a hole in it.

"All right, I've tried reasoning with you," Danny said, "but if you just want to blindly fight, then _be my guest!_"

Danny started by firing some ectoplasma at his enemy, and Horrick evidently suffered a lot of pain from it. Danny ran over to Horrick and started throwing random punches at him.

Yes, Danny felt guilt about just killing Horrick's daughter (or as he said it, an accident) but he had tried being reasonable, but Horrick was still understandably angry about the entire thing. Now all Danny wanted to do was beat him once and for all, and it looked like it was about to happen.

"You realize I don't want to fight you after what just happened to your daughter," Danny assured. "But I gotta defend myself too, you know."

Horrick tried getting up, but Danny just fired more ectoplasma at him. Horrick rolled over and began moaning. He was now defeated.

Danny walked over to the slouching Horrick, who seemed to have absolutely no energy left. Being angry took enough energy out of him, so getting hit by two of Danny's blasts was sure to leave him with little strength left to battle.

When Danny was only inches away, Horrick looked up and looked like he was dying. His voice was shaking, and he could barely finish a complete sentence.

"Erg…all right, you've beaten me," Horrick admitted. "Please…kill me now so I don't have to suffer anymore."

"You don't know the meaning of the word," Danny disagreed. "Besides, I'm not going to kill you. And I told you, I didn't kill your daughter either. A mace fell on her after she made a small earthquake, so it's her own fault."

Horrick looked furious with what Danny was saying. "Fine…" he choked out as he looked like his life was about to end. "If you won't finish me, then…I SHALL FINISH YOU!"

Horrick suddenly got a huge adrenaline spike and lifted both of his legs up. He crushed Danny's head between his calves, and then flipped Danny of his head with it.

As Danny fell on the ground, Horrick jumped up and started running away. Danny quivered for a little bit before he got up and stared off in the direction Horrick ran. "Well, so much for finishing me."

Danny started walking in the direction that Horrick ran off to, and saw him standing at the front entrance to the mansion, which was the only way out. Standing right next to Horrick was Compton.

Obviously, when Horrick found Compton tied up, Horrick released him. Now, they were both staring at Danny angrily.

"Oh boy," Danny said to himself as he saw his two enemies giving him a savage look.

"Horrick told me what you did!" Compton yelled. "Why would you be cruel enough to kill his daughter? I only hunted ghosts so they wouldn't hurt others, not to put them through pain and suffering!"

"You got it all wrong!" Danny yelled. "Aria did that to herself! It _wasn't_ my fault!"

"Save it, Danny!" Compton yelled. "Horrick and I are now in this together against you. We both agreed to drop a mace on _your_ head to see how much _you_ like it!"

"Um…how about no?" Danny said.

"I will avenge Aria!" Horrick yelled. "I am going to ensure you go through the same pain as you die that I'm going through now!"

"And I'm going to ensure I get out of here before either of psychos shut up," Danny said. He fired a blast of ectoplasma at the door and flew out of it. He passed through the hole and was now out of Horrick's mansion, never wanting to have to go there again.

Meanwhile, inside the mansion, Horrick and Compton ran to the door. Horrick put his head out of it and yelled to Danny as loud as he could, "WE WILL FIND YOU! WHEN WE FIND YOU, THAT WILL BE THE END! I WILL AVENGE MY DAUGHTER!"

Danny didn't even reply to it as he flew away. He found his way back to the portal to his house, trying to take in everything that just happened. The entire flight back he had a hard time swallowing what Horrick threatened him with as he was leaving. It was hard going to be hard sleeping at night, now knowing that there was a ghost and a ghost hunter who were after him, making sure he wouldn't live to see the next day.

As Danny finally saw the portal back to his house, he phased through it and found himself back in his house's basement. As he landed in it, he changed back into his human form and ran up the stairs.

"Mom! Dad!" he yelled, running frantically around the house. He searched around for a few seconds before he found his parents in the living room.

"Danny, what's wrong?" Maddie asked, fear and worry being visible through her red goggles.

"Mom, dad," Danny repeated, out of breath, "I just had to fight this ghost named Horrick, and he had a daughter, and I had to fight her. (he was saying all of this on the same breath) His daughter actually _died_ while I was fighting her, and now Horrick and Mr. Compton want to kill me!"

"Shhhhhhh," Maddie said, putting one finger over her lips as she tried to calm her son down. "You must be going crazy, because you just said Mr. Compton was trying to kill you."

"He is!" Danny insisted. "For some reason, he and some ghost are now trying to gang up on me, and…well, you know…"

"Danny, you have absolutely nothing to worry about," Jack said, standing up. "We're going to protect you, no matter what. If Mr. Compton tries to give you trouble, you just tell me and I'll teach him a thing or two."

"But you don't understand," Danny said, starting to sound very whiney. "Horrick and Compton are after me!"

"So? We got the equipment necessary to beat both of them!" Jack yelled with pride. "You don't have a thing to worry about, son!"

This soon plummeted when Maddie tapped Jack on the shoulder. "Jack, we threw all our ghost hunting stuff away, remember? It's sitting in the town dump now."

Jack's face turned to one of panic, but he tried not to show it. (Although he did a terrible job) "Well, don't worry. I'm sure we can find some way to make sure neither of them lay a finger on you."

"That's right," Maddie said, putting on the fakest confident smile Danny had ever seen.

All Danny could do was stare at his two parents with depression and fear running through his mind. He knew there was nothing they could to protect him or themselves if Horrick and Compton came over looking for him.

That night, Danny was sitting in his room. It was well past the time he should go to sleep, but he had so many things to worry about, it was downright impossible to. He lay awake for the longest time, thinking about how much of a danger he was now to his family and his friends. Horrick and Compton could pop up anytime, and if he was around his loved ones when that happened, what would he do?

There was only one solution Danny could think of. After debating it for a while, Danny got up and looked around the room. Instantly, he ran over to the corner of his room and pulled out an overnight bag that hadn't been used in a long time. He then quickly ran downstairs and packed some things that didn't require cooking to be able to eat, and he stuffed them into his bag.

After making sure there was a little bit of food in his bag, Danny ran over to his backpack and pulled out a pen and a notebook from it. He forcefully tore a page out of it and took it over to the table. He sat down at it and started writing on the paper.

_Dear mom, dad and Jazz,_

_I love you all so much, but I can't stay with you guys any longer. Compton and Horrick will always be after me now, and as long as I'm here, I'm only putting you guys in trouble. If either of them ever hurt one of you guys, I would never forgive myself._

_Jazz, you've been a pain sometimes, but you were only thinking of me and trying to make my life easier. Thank you very much for that. And mom and dad, even though you've humiliated me on more than one occasion, if it weren't for you and your hunting, I never would have gotten this privilege of defending people in the first place. _

Danny stopped writing and stared at what he wrote. His eyes immediately started filling with tears. He had never actually called having his ghost powers a privilege before. Struggling to get his mind back on track, he continued writing.

_I'm so sorry to have to do this, but you need to be as far away from me as possible. Dealing with Horrick and Compton is my problem now, and you guys suffering is the last thing I want to happen from it._

_I love all of you, and I always will. This will always be my home; you will always be my family, and not one day will pass where I won't think of you guys. _

_I'm hoping you guys are going to miss me, but please, whatever you do, don't come looking for me. I'm fourteen, and I can survive on my own. I took some food from the kitchen, hope you don't mind. If worse comes to worse, I'll just use my powers to take something from a grocery store, but only enough to get a meal. So please, don't worry about me._

_Once again, I love all of you and will miss you. Mom, dad and Jazz…please take care. I love you all. Tell Sam and Tucker I wish them the best of luck. _

_Love Always, Danny._

A tear dropped from Danny's eye and landed on the paper, creating a small wet spot between two of the straight blue lines. He read it over to make sure it said everything he wanted it to say, and when he was sure that was the letter he wanted his parents and sister to read, he got up from the table.

He looked at the clock. 1:00 in the morning. This was when Danny's life was going to change forever, but he wasn't sure he was ready for it.

Danny slammed the letter down onto the table and picked up his overnight bag. He walked towards the door and quietly opened it. Trying his best to not cry, he turned around and looked at his living room one last time.

Somehow, everything seemed so perfect now. He always thought of his living room as a shabby place that he resented. It seemed so plain and lifeless, but now it actually seemed like somewhere he couldn't wait to return to it.

"Do I really want to do this?" Danny asked himself, staring at the room and taking in everything about it as if he were seeing it for the first time. "It's taken me up until now to realize what a great life I've had. Do I really want to leave it now?"

Danny continued staring, but the tears continued to swell up in his eyes and come down on his face.

Then, he got reminded of something. He suddenly heard Horrick's voice screaming in his head, "_WE WILL FIND YOU! WHEN WE FIND YOU, THAT WILL BE THE END! I WILL AVENGE MY DAUGHTER!"_

Remembering Horrick's threat was the last straw. Danny had officially made his decision after that thought passed. He couldn't live with the thought of him putting his own family in mortal danger.

"There's no other option," he moaned. He turned away and walked out the door. With the overnight bag slumped over his shoulder and his eyes closed, he slowly took a hold of the doorknob and shut the door, not once looking back.


	13. Hunted

The night air was cold and stiff. The only source of light for the entire night was the streetlights that merely showed the road and which way it was going.

Danny decided to leave the road and instead travel through some trees or bushes. He didn't know where he was going, just as long as he could find somewhere that he thought would be far enough away from his house so he could keep his family out of danger.

Danny was feeling very cold running through these dark streets as his hair blew backwards over his head in the breeze he created for himself as he ran. He was breathing heavy and his heart was racing, but he had to ignore both of them if he wanted to stay away. At least, that's what he thought he had to do.

Danny stopped running for a while and started thinking to himself about what is was he planned to do next. Would he try to run away and stay close to school so he could still attend? Or would that only risk endangering his fellow classmates?

"I'm definitely not going anywhere near school grounds," Danny thought to himself. "I'd hate to think anyone would get hurt by Compton or Horrick just because I was close. I need to keep as low a profile as possible."

Danny continued walking down the lonely paths that he was choosing. The stiff air sent shivers down his spine, but he ignored them. The entire time he couldn't stop thinking about how much he would miss all of his friends and family, but that it was for their own good.

The boy continued to walk through the dark night, not knowing what he was getting himself in to. He walked off the road now and was hiking through some thin forests. The only sound that could be heard was the crunching of the dirt as Danny walked over it. The rest of the night and the forest were quiet.

Danny suddenly stopped when he felt something cold brush against his leg. It seemed to be moving fast, and Danny knew what it had to be. He was standing in a stream.

"A stream?" Danny asked. "Well, I guess I'm sleeping here tonight."

Letting out a huge yawn, Danny sprawled himself across the grass that was lying next to the stream. It was dark, so Danny couldn't really see what was around him too well. His eyes had gotten a bit more adjusted to the dark.

The cold grass actually felt relaxing on him for some reason. Danny could see the dew sparkling in the moonlight, same with the light sparkling in the stream.

Danny lay flat on his back with his arms behind his head. No, it wasn't the most comfortable sleeping position he had ever been in, but he thought it would pass for the night.

"_I wonder if my parents already know I'm gone,"_ Danny asked himself as he lay awake, looking at the stars. Everything seemed so peaceful that he even forgot for a moment or two that he was running from home to protect his family from Compton and Horrick. _"I hope they don't freak out when they see my note in the morning. I hope they understand that I'm doing this for them…"_

Danny just let out a soft sigh as all these thoughts raced through his head. He continued staring up at the stars, not blinking once. He was deeper in thought than he had been in a while. He had so many things to worry about now.

"_They'll understand, won't they? They'll definitely know that I'm doing this for them. Won't they?"_

Danny tried his best to forget about what was going on, but it was impossible. He simply just rolled over onto his side and did his best at falling asleep. After a little while, it actually worked.

Danny slowly drifted off to sleep, with his mind temporarily forgetting the difficult situation he was in now. Horrick and thirst for Danny's blood, and Compton had apparently set up some partnership between the two. That sounded like it would make one deadly combination to go up against.

Danny slept peacefully through the night. He woke up the next morning to the sweet smell of morning dew. He yawned and slowly sat up, and everything seemed so perfect. He felt like he was living in more of a utopia for some reason.

The sky was clear and the sun was shining brightly. The stream was sparkling with light from the sun, and the birds were singing merrily without a care in the world. Danny felt more like he was camping out in a beautiful place instead of running away from home and trouble.

"Wow, it's pretty nice out," Danny said. For the first time since he found himself in Horrick's mansion, he was smiling. But that smile quickly turned to being grossed out when he looked at himself.

"Heh, I'm a mess," Danny thought to himself. His clothes had gotten pretty dirty from having to sleep on the grass all night. Plus, he hadn't taken a shower for a while now. He was definitely not someone you'd want to be around without a clothespin to pinch your nose closed. "Well, I got a stream right there. Maybe I'll clean myself off in it."

Danny sat up and kicked his shoes off. He then took his socks off pulled his t-shirt off. He put his socks inside his shoes and stuffed them under a bush, but left his shirt where it was.

He began taking little baby steps into the water, which was surprisingly cold. It took him a few seconds, but he got adjusted to it. After a little while, he was now completely in up to his neck. For some reason the cold water felt really good on him. It almost felt like it was washing away not only his body odor, but also his problems. It felt really relaxing somehow.

"Ah…maybe living on my own won't be so bad," Danny thought to himself. "If it means being able to relax like this, maybe running away _was_ the best solution for me and my family."

Danny continued to just relax for a while in the water before he got out, feeling much better. He dried himself off with his shirt, and just as he was about to put it back on, he heard something. Curiously, he checked where it was coming from.

Danny's heart actually stopped when he saw where it was coming from. It was Compton! Trying not to make any noise, Danny took cover and hid behind a tree, hoping that Compton wouldn't walk in the direction Danny thought he would.

After breathing heavily and looking out from behind the tree to see where Compton was headed, Danny quietly put his t-shirt back on and considered making a mad run for it. But that idea was quickly dashed when he saw Compton take something out of his pocket. It appeared to be some sort of radio.

Compton put the radio up to his mouth and hit a button on it. A small static sound was heard coming from it. "Horrick? Come in, Horrick."

"Oh great," Danny moaned. "He and Horrick have walkie-talkies? Sheesh, they're insane!"

"_I'm getting a clear sending from you," _Danny heard Horrick respond to Compton's walkie-talkie, despite the loud static sounds and the running stream. _"Any idea on Danny's whereabouts?"_

"His family says he ran off," Compton said into the radio. "I'm looking for him right now, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's all a…hey, what's that!"

"_What is it?"_ Horrick inquired through the walkie-talkie.

"I see someone's shoes sitting under a bush around here," Compton answered. Danny looked from behind the tree and saw Compton bending down to where Danny had put his shoes before he went to clean off.

"These are definitely his," Compton said with a disturbingly high amount of certainty in his voice. "Horrick, get down to the stream on the southern edge of town. He left his shoes here, so he can't be far away."

"_Nice work, Compton,"_ Horrick said through all the static. _"I'll be over in a few minutes."_

Compton hit a dial on his walkie-talkie and shoved it into his pocket. He immediately pulled what looked like a firearm used for ghost hunting out from his vest and started acting like he was a guard trying to patrol a fort.

Danny's heart was pounding. He felt now like he was a hunted animal in a jungle or something like that. Compton's rifle or whatever it was used for was probably a lot more sophisticated and dangerous than anything Danny's parents ever came up with, so he had to be very careful to make it away from Compton without getting spotted. If he got caught, game over.

A minute later, Danny heard a whooshing sound. He turned to where Compton was and saw that Horrick had just landed there. The two of them started talking about what they were going to do and how they were going to capture Danny. It was evident that they planned on splitting up and heading into different directions, therefore making it impossible for him to get away.

Danny looked at the pattern Horrick and Compton were making as they circled through their specific areas, trying to head him off.

"All right, I think I got it," Danny said softly after observing the sequence for a moment or two. "Compton always makes once circle around the oak tree, then heads into the bushes and circles those for a while. At the same time, Horrick goes and makes a figure-eight between those five trees right there. If I wait until they've made the pattern enough times, they could be far enough apart so I can make a run right through the field without them catching me."

Danny waited a few more minutes, and then when he thought the time was right, he made a break for it. He ran as fast as his legs would allow him to. "I'm doing it!" Danny thought to himself happily. "I'm gonna make it past them!"

"Hey! There he is!" yelled Compton from behind.

Danny stopped and turned around, and Compton was standing there, arming his rifle and getting ready to fire it at him. "…or not," Danny moaned.

Danny was no longer running. Now he was sprinting. He was pushing his body way past his limits, but he got some extra energy from the circulation and adrenaline of knowing there was a guy with a gun right behind him who wasn't afraid to fire it.

Compton fired his rifle. The scary part was that it didn't look like a regular rifle. It looked very silver and long and looked more like something out of a science fiction movie. But that only made Danny think it was _worse_ than a regular rifle.

The sound of the rifle firing sounded more like a small cannon being launched. It made a loud _splooshing _sound when it hit the water as Danny was running through the stream. Danny glanced to his side and saw the large splash the bullet (or whatever was being fired) made when it hit the stream.

The fourteen-year old continued running for his life after Compton fired shot after shot at him.

"Horrick!" yelled Compton. "Come over here and give me a hand!"

Danny turned his head as he continued running and he saw Horrick was standing on the other side of the stream with Compton.

"I'll fly over to the other side to head him off!" Horrick yelled. He ascended into the air and started flying after Danny, so now Danny was in a bit of trouble. Thinking fast, he made a quick turn and started running _up_ the stream rather than through it.

Danny had no idea what good that would do him, but he would rather get beaten by Compton than by Horrick.

Compton made one last shot with his rifle, and it hit Danny dead-on. Instantly, a strong net erupted from the fired capsule and trapped Danny in it.

"Ha! No net's gonna bring me down!" he yelled. He morphed into his ghost half and started to break out of it, but he had no success. "Oh great, a ghost net…"

"That's it, Horrick!" Compton yelled with delight. "I got him!"

No matter how hard Danny tried, he couldn't break free of the net. Apparently, the technology the Comptons used to make ghost hunting equipment _was_ a lot more sophisticated and powerful than the kind used by Danny's parents.

Danny nervously scrunched up in the net as Compton began walking towards him. "Horrick!" yelled Compton. "Why don't you take Danny to your house? I believe we have something special to show him."

Horrick started chuckling in a low tone, then grabbed the net that encased Danny and started flying into the air with him. Danny was now very worried about where Horrick was taking him, and Compton also seemed to be tagging along, except following on foot.

The flight seemed endless. Danny could only think about where Horrick was carrying him, and he soon got an answer. As Horrick flew through the air, something caught his sight, which was apparently where he wanted to land. The disturbing thing was that the landing spot was right in front of his house!

Horrick let the net drop to the ground as Danny landed hard on it. He hit the ground with a hard thud, still tangled in the net and not able to move. Compton came over and cut the net around Danny, freeing him of the net, but put handcuffs on him as soon as the net was off of him.

"Follow us, Danny!" Horrick commanded. He and Compton went into Danny's house while Danny had no choice but to follow. The creepiest part of all was that his house was completely deserted.

"_Where is everybody?" _Danny asked himself as he was being led through the empty house.

Compton and Horrick led Danny downstairs and into the basement. Everything seemed normal, but the portal was active.

"_I don't like the looks of this…"_

Without warning, Compton shoved Danny through the portal, and he was now floating through the Ghost Zone, with Compton and Horrick keeping a close watch over him. The path the two were leading him down through the Ghost Zone was a long one, but Danny thought he knew where he was going.

His worst thoughts proved correct when he saw he had been led right to the front door of Horrick's mansion. He was shoved inside the door and was led down into a dungeon like room.

The room was a large and empty one. The only thing that was in it was one giant ball in the center of the room, and the ball was glowing.

"Take a look inside that glowing ball, Ghost Child," Horrick ordered, "and tell me what you see in it."

Danny squinted into the massive ball as it glowed a soft shade of cerulean in front of him. When he realized what was inside, he was filled with horror.

"N…NO!" he yelled in disbelief.


	14. Incinerated

Danny stared in complete disbelief as he looked at the glowing ball in front of him. Inside the glowing blue ball was something that he had always been dreading would happen ever since his problems with Horrick started, and now it looked like they were about to come true.

"Mom! Dad! Jazz!" Danny yelled.

It was his family: Jazz and his parents. The three of them were trapped inside the glowing ball, unable to move or do anything to help themselves escape. Things only got worse when he looked to the side.

"Oh no…" Danny moaned.

Now it was worse. Not only were Danny's parents trapped inside that glowing ball, but so were his friends, Sam and Tucker. They were all standing like statues with fear and terror written all over their faces. They looked like they were in line to go into a guillotine.

Horrick and Compton had found them all and captured them and could now do whatever horrible things he wanted to any of them.

"Heh heh heh heh heh," Horrick chuckled. "You see what happens when I want revenge, Ghost Child?" he asked. "When I want revenge, I get it! Now I have you and your family to make suffer and torment."

"If you lay a finger on them, I'll rip your face off, stuff it in a package and mail it to you for Christmas. How does that sound!" Danny yelled, turning his attention away from the glowing ball and looking back at Horrick.

"Calm down, Danny," he said, pretending to be soothing. "I'll gladly let them go. On _one_ condition: give me your powers."

"My powers?" Danny shrieked. He looked around to his family, and he saw their eyes filled with fear and helplessness. He then looked back at his loved ones who had never seen so helpless and desperate. He passed quick glances to both the glowing ball and Horrick, not sure what to do.

"_What am I supposed to do?"_ Danny asked himself. _"Should I just give up and let Horrick have my powers? Hey, it'll guarantee my family and friends they'll survive, plus it'll be a huge weight off my shoulders. If I give up my powers, not only will my family be okay, but I also won't have to fight anymore. It'll be like killing two birds with one stone!"_

For a while, Danny thought that was the most logical decision to make. But then, some thoughts started clouding his thinking, and those thoughts made him think twice about whether or not he really wanted to just give up like that.

"_But if I give up my powers, Horrick is going to take them and make himself stronger. What then? All I'll have done is create this huge threat to everyone. If Horrick gets my powers, then who's going to beat him? Compton is on his side now and my parents threw out all their ghost hunting equipment. Besides, he never said anything about not killing ME. I'M the one he wants to kill, and he probably will if I give up my powers. Giving all my strength to some psychopath who has no enemies to stand in is way is the LAST thing I want to do if I'm going to die."_

"Make your choice, Danny," Horrick hissed, trying to put as much pressure on him as possible. Horrick pressed a small button on a remote control he had pulled out of his pocket. As soon as he hit the button, water started to pour into the ball, and with Danny's loved ones trapped inside, it wasn't going to be long before the water went in to the top of the ball and submerged everyone inside of it, drowning them.

"Now is the time to choose," Horrick continued. "Surrender your powers to me now, or let your loved ones meet a watery grave."

Danny continued to just look at Horrick and his family back and forth. Water continued to fill up the spherical tank as Danny's loved one's faces continued to look more and more horrified about what it was Danny was going to decide to do. As he stared back at them, rage swelled up inside of him.

Without warning, Danny instead fired a solid and painful punch right to Horrick's skull. Horrick screamed in pain and was knocked to the floor, dropping the remote.

Danny stormed over to Horrick as he lay on the ground. While Horrick was still in serious pain, Danny grabbed the remote and smashed the button on it, stopping the water from pouring in. He then resorted to firing a blast at the controller and breaking it to pieces, so no one could start the flow of water again.

Danny passed a quick glance to Compton, who was now looking extremely terrified. When he saw Danny's raging stare, he dashed out of the room as quickly as he could, almost tripping as he went out the doorway.

After staring at the doorway after Compton exited, Danny ran over to the giant sphere of water and started trying to talk to his family and friends through it.

"Guys, you okay?" Danny screamed, trying to be loud enough for his voice to travel through the thick surface of the ball. As he yelled, he pounded the side of his fist on it. "I'm going to get you out of there, I promise!"

Danny looked at Jazz, and she looked really worried. Danny couldn't hear a thing she was saying, but she was screaming something and pointing to something behind her brother. It looked like she was saying "Danny, look out!"

After seeing Jazz and being sure she was trying to tell him something, he turned around and saw Horrick ready to fire some ectoplasmic energy at him. Danny was able to duck out of the way just in time and the ray hit a wall behind them instead.

"So, you wanna fight, do ya?" Danny asked. "Fine! I've taken you on before, and I _know_ I can cream you!"

It was true. Danny had fought Horrick before, and he had beaten Horrick with little effort. Just because he had reason to try to kill Danny this time didn't mean he had actually gotten more strength.

As expected, Danny completely pummeled Horrick. It was nothing except punch, after punch, after punch. Horrick could barely stay standing as Danny fired one blow after another to Horrick's face.

Danny topped it off by firing an ectoplasmic blast into Horrick's face. Horrick just fell to the ground like a thud after that. He just stared at Horrick coldly for a few seconds before running back to the sphere where his family and friends were trapped and up to about their hips in water.

"You guys all right?" Danny asked, a little short of breath after that brief brawl.

Everyone nodded their head and tried talking, but Danny couldn't hear anything. When he realized this, he just tried to find a way to get them out of there.

"All right, I'll just get you guys out of there and…"

Danny was struck over the back of the head. He screamed as he clutched his now-burning skull from the impact. He turned around after being dropped to his knees, trying to see who hit him. It was Horrick, back on his feet.

"You dirty little punk," Horrick hissed.

"Hey, that doesn't sound like something a classy European-sounding guy should be saying," Danny said, not getting up.

"Would you rather I just let you die like those classy Europeans did during the Middle Ages?" Horrick said, grabbing Danny by the front of the jumpsuit and pulling him closer.

"Normally, I'd say yes," Danny agreed. "There's just one problem: this isn't the Middle Ages anymore."

After that response, Danny fired another blast into Horrick's face, causing Horrick to drop him. Danny fell on the ground, but got up in a matter of seconds.

"_This guy's crazy,"_ Danny thought to himself. _"If I fight him in here, he's going to blow this entire room up. I can't let him fight in here while my parents and Jazz and Sam and Tucker are still stuck in there. I gotta get him out of here if we're going to fight to the death."_

As Horrick was still recovering from the hit, Danny ran out of the room and into another one as fast he could go. Horrick, now upset that the person he wanted vengeance on for killing his daughter was running away, started to growl. He made haste down the winding hallways in the mansion and tried to follow Danny so the stand-off battle could continue.

Danny was running and eventually found a room, but it was one he was familiar with. It was the same room he was in the first time he got captured and brought to Horrick's mansion. It was the room with gas valves and hoses, as well as some dangerous looking chemicals all over the room. Radiators and heaters lined the sides of the room, just like always.

Danny was doing his best to keep quiet, but he knew it wouldn't be long before Horrick came by and found him hiding. And sure enough, it wasn't. Horrick soon popped his head in the doorway and gave Danny the most malicious stare-down he had given him yet.

"This is the end, Danny!" he threatened. "One of us is going down _now!"_

"Yeah, and I can safely tell you right now it's NOT going to be me!"

Danny fired a blast of energy and hit Horrick in chest, sending his enemy to the ground with a thud. As Horrick got up, Danny noticed that the deep scar on Horrick's arm from slicing himself with a knife when he proved he and Danny were connected seemed to be getting worse. The puncture could now clearly be seen going very deep, and just about anything in the air would able to get into it. It looked pretty gross.

When Horrick was on his feet again, he ran over to a shelf and grabbed a glass container from it. He started launching them at Danny as fast as he could. Luckily, Horrick wasn't so strong, so he didn't seem to be throwing nearly hard enough for it to be a challenge to dodge all of the containers.

"All right, now you're just wasting my time," Danny remarked after Horrick had run out of things to throw at him. "If you're going to threaten me, at least be a _bit_ of a threat."

But Danny had talked a second too long, because Horrick fired his own blast of ectoplasmic energy and knocked Danny to the ground. As Danny moaned in pain for a bit and tried to get up, Horrick ran to a corner of the room and pulled something out.

It was one of the gas hoses in the room. He ran towards Danny as fast as he could with it. When he was right at Danny's feet, he pointed the nozzle on the hose right at his Danny's face.

"That's it, Ghost Boy!" Horrick snapped. Danny's eyes widened in disbelief as he saw the front end of the hose ready to spray toxic gas into his face and poison (or suffocate) him. "Your time has come! Now Aria shall be avenged!"

At the last possible second, Danny kicked Horrick's shin, causing him to lose balance. Horrick had just pulled the trigger on the hose, causing the gas to come spraying out just as he lost his footing.

As he was trying to regain himself, Horrick couldn't help but keep his finger on the trigger to the hose. As he fell backwards, the gas sprayed out and went right by the heater. As soon as the hot hair from the heater came into contact with the gases, the two ignited, creating a huge blaze of fire.

The fire started spraying backwards and went right onto Horrick. In no time, Horrick was screaming loud enough that someone would think he just had a wrecking ball dropped on his foot. He began running around the room randomly as he continued to catch fire.

Danny watched in horror as he saw Horrick, who was now looking like a human torch. He ran around the room screaming loudly. And if Danny could have done something to extinguish Horrick and stop him from catching fire like that, he would. But there was nothing he could do.

Finally, Horrick couldn't take it anymore. While he was still on fire, his entire body just gave up and knelt down. But he knelt down in the wrong place, which was right by the bottles of chemicals that he had been throwing at Danny a little while before. As soon as the fire came into contact with those chemicals, the fire on Horrick exploded with chemicals as they touched him.

After the massive explosion, all Danny could see was a massive fireball with Horrick inside of it. Horrick didn't seem to be moving.

"Hope you wanted to be cremated," Danny cracked at the fire.

Danny made a quick run out of the room with the roasting Horrick in it. He now knew the mansion well enough to know where the exit was now, and that was the place he was headed. He made his way down the never-ending hallways until he finally reached the front door. However, there was an obstacle in the way. Compton was standing at the doorway out with his arms crossed.

"That's as far as you go!" he challenged.

Danny thought it was ludicrous how Compton was trying to stop him. Compton had no weapons or equipment whatsoever; Danny wasn't about to just surrender like that.

"Dude, get out of my way," Danny said.

Compton continued to just stand there with his arms crossed. He barely even moved at all.

"Last chance, Compton!" Danny yelled, starting to get irritated.

"You're not going anywhere, Danny! Do you understand me! You're not leaving this mansion, and that's tha…"

Danny didn't let Compton finish; he instead just fired a blast of ectoplasmic energy right at Compton's temple, knocking him out cold. Compton fell to the ground after taking Danny's hit, his eyes closed and a bit of blood.

"That takes care of Compton and Horrick," Danny remarked. "Now all I gotta do is get everyone out of that blue ball thingy."


	15. Tangled in the Law

I haven't done this for the past few chapters, so thank you Leppers for reviewing my story up to this point. (where'd you go, WeirdIT?) Anyway, thank you Leppers for reviewing this story, you know why I like getting reviews so much, so please keep the reviews coming. Oh yes, it looks for bright for a ToS fanfic to come too, so keep your fingers crossed!

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Danny ran back into the room he was in a little while ago. He had just blasted Compton in the head when he was standing in the way, not to mention just witnessing Horrick go up in flames. He wanted this whole thing to end, and now it would finally would.

There was no sound to be heard except for Danny's heavy breathing as he ran through the carpeted hallways. His footsteps echoed due to the fact there was no other feeling of anything being alive other than him.

Finally, he reached the room that had his family and friends in it. He seemed relieved to see they were all okay and that it didn't look like they were hurt or anything like that.

"Good to see guys are okay," Danny said as he walked in. The sphere was still filled up partially with water, but it looked like everything else was fine. Everyone in there seemed to be relieved to see Danny was going to get them out.

Danny looked around for some door or switch that would open up the container, but he found nothing. After being frustrated and perplexed by not finding anything to open the circular container, he finally had enough.

"Okay then, if this thing won't open, I'll have to get you guys out of there some other way," Danny concluded. "All of you, stand still and don't move."

Danny's family and friends stood completely still, just as he asked. They had no idea what he was doing, but they found out soon enough that he had figured out a way to get them out.

Danny pointed his palm at a place on the sphere where no one was standing, and then he fired a thin blast of ectoplasmic energy at the container. He slowly started firing the beam lower and lower, like he was cutting off the end of a plate of steel with a blowtorch.

After Danny had made a straight line down the middle of the sphere, it split open and all the water came pouring out. When all the water was out, Danny's parents, his sister, and his two best friends joyfully hopped out of it and ran over to Danny, all of them with huge smiles on them.

"Danny, that was awesome!" Tucker exclaimed.

"Hey, where's that other ghost?" Sam asked.

"You mean Horrick? Well, let's just say I always thought he needed to chill out. Anyway, it's over guys. You're all safe again."

"Thank you so much, sweetie!" Maddie yelled, running over to Danny and giving him such a tight hug to the extent where he thought she was going to snap him in half. Her mood suddenly turned angry after that, though. She stood up straight and put her hands on her hips. "But you're in big trouble for running away, do you hear me!"

Danny had completely forgotten about running away the night before. He still thought it was the safest thing to do, but even that got his family and friends into trouble. He didn't care right now about what kind of punishment he got. What he was concerned about now was the fact that everyone he cared about was safe.

"I don't know about you guys," Danny said, "but I _really_ want to get out of here."

"Yeah," everyone said in unison.

Danny turned around and led everyone to the front door of the mansion. Although everyone was completely quiet, there was a massive feeling of relief from everybody that they would finally be leaving this nightmare that had engulfed them fro the past couple of days.

Danny led all of them out of the Ghost Zone and back to the portal leading into their basement. The entire flight back was silent, but it wasn't so bad. After all, what could anybody possibly want to say after that encounter?

As all of them passed through the swirling portal, they found themselves back in their basement. It was a wonderful feeling for everyone to finally be out.

Jack was the first to get up and stretch his legs. He let out loud sounds from his mouth as he tried to get adjusted back to his regular physics.

"Little brother, that was awesome!" Jazz yelled, running over to Danny and giving him a big hug.

"Uh…yeah," Danny carelessly and humbly said.

"Well Danny, you're still in huge trouble!" Maddie yelled. "Now your father and I need some time to think of an appropriate punishment for running away and scaring us to death."

"Oh, oh, I got an idea!" Jack yelled. "Why don't we all go out to eat tonight to celebrate this!"

"Jack?" Maddie asked. "How's that a punishment?"

"Oh, we can always worry about punishing him tomorrow, right Danny?"

"Uh…sure?" Danny weakly said.

"Then it's settled! Let's go to Grease City for some dinner!"

"But Jack, we don't have the income right now to afford this…"

"Maddie, in a world of money, nobody gets in the way of Jack Fenton and his appetite. Now let's get going!"

Danny and Tucker seemed excited about going out to eat at a restaurant called Grease City, but Jazz and Sam were a little more laid back about it.

"Yuck," both girls said in unison. Their eyes widened, and then they passed quick glances to each other.

"Okay, that's _one_ thing we have in common," Sam admitted.

Just as everyone was ready to head out the door, a knocking sound was heard. Everyone looked at each other to see who should answer the door until Jazz finally agreed to do it. She walked over to the door and pleasantly opened it until she saw who was standing there.

Jazz opened the door to see the middle-aged, angry faces of Mr. and Mrs. Compton. Jazz was really grossed out by a huge bulging scar that was on the part of Mr. Compton's head where Danny had blasted him a little while ago.

"You!" Mrs. Compton yelled, pointing her finger at Danny, "you get over here right now!"

Danny started to walk towards them until Jack grabbed at Danny's shoulder, basically telling him not to do what she was ordering him to do. "Danny, I'll take care of this."

Jack went up to Mrs. Compton and said, "Can I help you?"

This seemed to infuriate Mrs. Compton. "Have you seen my husband! Look at what your son did to him!"

Jack looked at the huge scar where Danny's ectoplasmic blast had hit him back in Horrick's mansion. "Wow, that's quite a mole you got growing on you."

"You idiot!" Compton yelled. "It's a scar your son gave me when he was fooling around with your ghost equipment!"

"_Oh no," _Danny thought to himself. _"I guess they couldn't see me too well when they were trapped in that sphere-like thing in Horrick's mansion. I guess they couldn't even see Mr. Compton when they were locked in there."_

"My husband tells me that your son was fooling around with your ghost equipment as if they were toys and accidentally hurt my husband with it," Mrs. Compton shrieked.

Danny's insides began boiling with rage. He looked Compton in the eye and yelled, "That's not what happened and you know it!"

"Don't lie, Danny!" Mr. Compton snapped. "You were playing with your dad's Fenton Bazooka and fired it right at me."

Danny wanted nothing more than to go ghost and punch Compton in the face, but that would only lead to more and more trouble.

"What do you want?" Maddie asked, putting her hands on her hips.

"We want to settle this issue in court," Mrs. Compton replied coldly. "We're going to get what we deserve, and so will you."

"You can't take this into court!" Danny yelled, jumping in.

"We can and we did," Compton said, giving Danny a malicious look. "We've hired a lawyer and he is filing a lawsuit for us as we speak."

Both of them walked away, leaving Danny, his family and friends staring at them, wondering what they were going to do. They did their best to try to react calmly, but everyone was clearly worried, including Sam and Tucker.

Despite the obvious problem that was now facing the Fentons they decided to try to balance their problems anyway by going to Grease City anyway. Of course, no one could really enjoy it that much, particularly Danny. Because of a lie about him, his parents were now going to be sued. Compton now felt like much more of a threat now.

Danny eventually came up with a solution. Normally, an idea like this would be way too dark for him, but Compton has pressed his luck a little too far, and now Danny thought he really needed to pay for it.

"_I could always go into my ghost form and fire rays at Compton until he's dead. Or maybe I should just destroy everything in his house. No, he'd immediately know it was me who did it and only push my parents further into a lawsuit. Why don't I just destroy both of them? No…I'm not a killer."_

Danny tried to sleep his problems off. At least by sleeping he would get some peace. Who knows? Maybe in the morning he'd have an idea on how to deal with Compton and to at least get him to cancel the lawsuit.

But as Danny woke up, he found that he had no ideas. To his disappointment, he had no better idea on how to convince Compton the lawsuit was a bad idea. Luckily, now that he thought fighting him or Horrick would no longer be a problem, he was actually able to enjoy school a little more.

Danny went into school as always, and for some reason, he was feeling a lot happier than he had been the past few days, and it really surprised everyone, including Danny's teachers.

A time came in the middle of the day when the juice he had with breakfast had run its course. After excusing himself from class for a minute or two, Danny started walking down the halls to his school and headed towards the bathroom.

As Danny walking into the bathroom, he was thrown back from a giant explosion that came out of the bathroom. He landed hard on his back, but was lucky to still be alive. He looked up and saw a giant fire blazing out of the boy's bathroom.

No sooner did the explosion erupt from the bathroom did the fire alarm and emergency sprinklers go off. Since there was a real fire this time, everyone burst from the classroom in a state of panic, screaming at the top of their lungs as they raced through the door.

Since no one was paying attention except to where the door was (along with noticing that their new shoes were getting wet), Danny took the opportunity to figure out what was going on.

After no one was in sight, Danny stood up and transformed into his ghostly half. He pushed his way through the raging flames from the bathroom and ran inside. It felt like he was in an oven, but he wanted to see where the fire came from to see if there was any way he could stop it.

The entire inside of the boys' bathroom seemed to be turning red, whether it was the walls, the stalls or the sinks. Danny didn't want to touch any of them fearing that he would get burned if he did.

Danny looked through every part of the bathroom. It was getting really hot in there, and he didn't want to stay in the enclosed ignited room too much longer. After checking every square inch of the burning restroom, Danny was shocked with what he found in it.


	16. The Secret's Out

Nothing. The shocking part was that he found nothing in the bathroom that could have possibly caused the explosion and the fire.

"All right, I'm getting out of here before I turn into a flambe," Danny said. He flew his way out of the fiery bathroom. Looking at his jumpsuit, he couldn't tell whether or not the thick wet spots on it were from body sweat or from the overhead emergency sprinklers. Danny ran under one to cool himself off from the intense heat he just had to endure.

Later that afternoon, Danny ran home and found his parents sitting in the living room, slumped over the sofa like rag dolls. Danny supposed that they had nothing to do now that they had forsaken their ghost hunting ways.

"Mom, dad, the weirdest thing happened at school today!" Danny reported. "I was going into the bathroom, and just as I was about to walk in, this giant thing of fire just blew out of the bathroom and nearly toasted me!"

"Wait, there was a fire in your school?" Jack said, standing up. "Are you all right? Is Jazz all right! What happened!"

"Jazz, calm down," Maddie said in a soothing voice. "If the fire was near the boys' bathroom, I'm sure Jazz was _very_ far away from it."

Jack slowly quieted down as Danny continued. "Anyway, it was weird because I went into my ghost form to check it out, but there was no sign of anything in there."

"What!" Jack yelled. "You actually went _in_ while the bathroom was on fire!"

"Chill out, dad," Danny pleaded, "I've done more dangerous stuff. Anyway, I just thought you should know."

After telling his parents, Danny went up into his room to do his homework. He worked on it for about half an hour before he finished. Breathing a huge sigh of relief, Danny dropped his homework on the floor to his room and went over to the TV. He hooked his Playstation 2 up and started playing one of his games.

As Danny continued playing, he heard the telephone ring. He quickly paused the game and got up, then walked to the nearest phone around.

"Hello?" he politely answered.

"Danny?" asked the person on the other line.

Danny groaned and had a look of frustration on. "Mr. Compton! All right, you have ten seconds to tell me why you called before I hang up, and three just passed."

Compton started chuckling to himself. "Danny, I have something I would like to ask of you?"

"You mean like a favor? What's the word…um…NO!"

"It's not a favor, ghost boy!" Compton yelled through the phone. "It's a request. I want you to come into the Ghost Zone later tonight at around midnight and meet me in front of Horrick's mansion. There are some things we need to discuss."

"Why do we need to meet there?" Danny yelled. "Why don't you just talk to my parents about this!"

"Because your parents won't help. It has to be you, Danny. Now, you can come tonight, or you can not come and have me tell everyone at school your secret."

Danny scoffed. "No one would believe you. They'd think you're a nutcase who's trying to make me look bad."

"Can you afford to take that chance?" Compton said. He hung up after that remark.

Danny slammed the phone on the hook and sulked about what just happened. He thought about what he should do. Compton was actually right at the end: would Danny want to risk Compton telling everyone at school about his secret?

"_Maybe I should go," _Danny thought to himself. _"What can Compton possibly do? I know for a fact he WOULD tell everyone at school I was a ghost if I didn't meet him tonight, and he MIGHT tell people I'm a ghost if I go, so I might as well just go. Besides, if he gives me any trouble, I'll knock him out. It's that simple."_

Night came soon, and everyone in the house was sleeping soundly. That is, everyone except for Danny. He forced himself to stay awake until his bedroom clock said it was midnight.

When that time finally came, Danny slowly crept out of his bed and snuck down the stairs into his basement. The stairs made eerie creaking sounds, a few of them even made Danny's heart jump a little.

In the middle of the night, the basement not only seemed very empty and lifeless, but also very creepy. It was scary to know that there were tools for hunting ghosts in that very room in the dark.

Danny slowly walked over to the turned off ghost portal. He picked up the giant plug that powered the device and forced it into an outlet. As that happened, the portal started making loud noises as it fired up. Moments later, a swirling green spiral was visible in the portal. The portal was now active.

Transforming into his ghost half, Danny flew inside the portal and headed for Horrick's mansion, not knowing what to expect. The long path to the mansion seemed very disturbing for some reason, but Danny knew there was nothing to worry about.

The long flight ended when Danny saw the giant house floating in an isolated place. He knew this was the place due to the giant forest that loomed behind the house. By going into that forest, you would be just _begging_ to get lost.

Right at the front door to the mansion was Mr. Compton. His face seemed to light up a little bit when he saw Danny coming.

Compton seemed different. Danny figured it was because he looked like he was wearing a giant piece of metal. When he looked at it, Danny couldn't shake the feeling that he saw what Compton was wearing before. He quickly shrugged it off as he went and flew right in front of his enemy.

"All right Mr. Compton, here I am," Danny resented. "Now what do you want?"

"Danny, I see you've made the right decision," Compton said with an evil expression over his round face.

"Just cut to the chase, what is it?" Danny yelled. "And if you try anything funny, I've got some punches with your name written all over'em!"

Compton didn't seem to be intimidated by this at all. "Danny, there is but one thing I want you to do. I want you to surrender your ghost powers."

Danny let out a loud laugh. "You think I should give up all my powers and strengths just because you said so? Forget it!"

"No," Compton calmly replied, starting to sound much more serious. "But I think you should do it because _Horrick_ said so."

Danny's eyes widened and he passed his glance to the front doors of the mansion. The front door opened, and from the inside walked out Horrick. Danny gasped to see him.

Horrick looked exactly as he should. His ghostly green skin now looked very charred and burnt. He had several blisters all over his hands, and he had a scar or two on his face. His teeth now looked very stained, some of the tips of them even being charred and burned off.

Horrick didn't say anything to Danny. Instead, he backed back into his house and closed the door without turning around. Danny watched in complete silence as the door closed.

"Horrick tells me you can either surrender your powers, or you can die," Compton threatened. "I think the right answer is fairly obvious, but it's your decision."

Danny was snarling under his breath for the longest time, not taking his eyes of Compton once. Finally, he screamed out. "No way!"

Compton's look seemed to get angrier and more aware of what was going on, but he didn't say a word.

"You and Horrick don't scare me! Why don't you both just go away and live the rest of your lives away from me! You can bug me until you've had enough of getting your butts beat, but you're _not_ getting my powers!"

"So be it," Compton said in a low voice. He pressed a button on his metal suit and wings sprouted from the back of it. The wings were also made of metal and looked long. Jets were on the undersides of them, propelling Compton to fly away quickly.

Danny suddenly remembered where he saw that suit before. When Compton was setting him up to be captured by inviting Danny over his house, Danny saw the very same ghost hunting suit in Compton's ghost-hunting room. Danny had no idea what kind of powers or attacks that suit was capable of.

When Compton was out of sight and he was sure Horrick wasn't coming out of his house, Danny turned around and flew back to the portal. He was now nervous after finding out Horrick was alive, and he knew Compton was going to be a bit of a threat now with that ghost hunting suit. Danny could tell that suit was much more powerful than anything his parents could have come up with.

Danny flew back through the portal and shut it. He then changed out of his ghost form and then went back to bed. He was now wide awake and his brain was busy trying to go over everything that just happened, making it even harder for him to sleep.

The next day at school, Danny was trying to figure out what his next move should be. It wasn't long before he was interrupted, though.

"Hey Danny," one student said as they were walking through the halls, "are you, like, part ghost or something?"

"No!" Danny yelled, accidentally causing a little bit of suspicion upon himself.

"That's not what I heard," said another student as she also walked over to Danny. "I heard you're really a ghost!"

Several other students walked over to Danny and started crowding around him. He finally had enough of it and screamed, "Who told you I was part ghost!"

"Some guy with a British accent," one student replied. A chorus of "yeah's" started filling up the halls, indicating that they had also heard about it from the same source.

"_Compton…_" Danny coldly muttered under his breath. "No, I'm not a ghost!" He walked quickly over to a locker and started pounding his fist on it. "See? My hand's not going through it. There, you see? Not a ghost!"

Danny stormed away from the entire crowd, which had now grown to be pretty silent as whispering amongst themselves about what to believe. Danny, on the other hand, just wanted to ignore it and try to continue through his day without worrying about it too much.

Of course, easier said than done. As Danny went from one class to another, he kept getting asked by more people if the "rumor" spreading around the school about him was true. Since he came from a family of ghost hunters, some people were more convinced that it was true. Some found it even less possible to believe. But either way, they wouldn't leave him alone about it for most of the day.

Lunch time finally rolled by. Danny, Sam and Tucker were sitting at the table, and they noticed that there was something wrong with Danny. He seemed much more moody than normal, and they wanted to know why.

"Say Danny, what's eating ya?" Tuck asked after Danny went almost the entire period without saying a word.

"Yeah, you look like something's wrong," Sam added.

Danny dropped his fork and took a deep sigh. He looked up at his two friends and gave both of them brief stares before he started talking.

"A few days ago we got these new neighbors, the Comptons," Danny started. "To make a long story short, Compton figured out I was part ghost and now he's working together with some other ghost. And I think Compton just told a lot of people in school today my secret."

"That's ridiculous," Sam said. "Why would a grown man come in here and tell everyone you're part ghost?"

"He wanted me to surrender my powers," Danny answered. "This is probably his little version of revenge for me not giving my ghost strengths up."

"Well, if he really did it, you should go over his house and pound him!" Tucker suggested, punching mid air.

"Tucker!" Sam yelled.

"No, Tuck's right," Danny glumly agreed. "Compton's not learning his lesson by me just sitting here and letting him tell a lot of people my secret. I'm going to have to do something that will make him regret all the trouble he's put me through."

"So what are you gonna do, beat him up after school?" Sam asked.

"After school?" Danny said. "Why wait? I'm going to go deal with him right now."

When lunch ended, everyone started marching out of the cafeteria and off to their next class. But when no one was looking, he gave a quick signal to Sam and Tucker. He asked them to tell all his teachers that he was out sick that day, and they agreed to cover for him.

Now Danny was alone in a corner of the hall after sneaking out of the clump of people heading out of the cafeteria.

"That Compton guy is going to pay for telling everyone my secret!" Danny threatened to himself.

He morphed into his ghost half a second later. He made himself go intangible and flew through the roof of the school.

It was a weird feeling of freedom, to be out of school even if there were classes going on. As Danny hovered a few feet above the roof of the school, he looked around and saw the nearly empty streets all around.

"All right," Danny said. "Watch out, Compton! Here I come!"


	17. Confrontation

Well, I seem to have gotten quite a few questions about that past chapter. First, about the quote "It was scary to know that there were tools for hunting ghosts in that very room in the dark." The quote says "…there WERE tools for hunting...". Not to sound snobby or anything, but the "were" is supposed to be past tense in that instance. In other words, it means to say, "…there HAD BEEN tools…" I Hope that didn't confuse you.

It'll be hard to answer your other two questions. One of them will be answered by the end of the next chapter, but I think there is ONE question I can answer. Yes, the machine that severed the link between Danny and Horrick only broke them apart; it didn't do anything else. The machine that they were planning on using to take Danny's ghost half was a completely different machine. There's really no explanation for how the machine did it, it just did. (That's what it was designed to do)

For your two other questions about if the machine did anything else to Danny or if the story ever goes into court, just keep reading. You'll learn soon enough.

And since Jenna Dax asked me to, I'll tell you guys. Apparently, there's going to be a new episode of Danny Phantom on June 9 entitled "Ghoul's Out". The picture for it, according to Jenna Dax, features Danny transforming in school while everyone's watching him. Hey, that episode was bound to come on sooner or later, right?

And lastly, thank you very much Leppers for reviewing Jack's Journal. Thank you for taking the time to read it and reviewing it.

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Flying through the air gave Danny an advantage. Now, he could see much further. But spotting Compton should have been easy. After all, how many people can hide when they're wearing a metallic ghost hunting suit?

Danny flew away from school and looked in every direction, looking for Compton. He first checked the school yard, but Compton wasn't anywhere to be seen. Danny then checked the next most-obvious place, which was his home.

Danny flew to Compton's house, and surprisingly, Compton was standing at the front door to it. His silver-blue ghost hunting suit that covered his entire body from the neck down was gleaming in the sun. He had his hands on his hips and was staring up at Danny, almost like he was expecting him.

Danny gently decreased his altitude and got closer and closer to the ground. His feet gently landed on it, so there was no rebound or recoil that would cause him to feel any pain when he hit the ground.

There was an obvious and angry expression on Danny's face. He looked like he was about to murder someone or tear something apart, but he kept his hands clenched up into solid fists at his side.

"What were you thinking!" Danny raged, throwing his arms up in there with no care of how loud his voice got. "Why'd you have to go to school and tell everybody about my ghost half! We may be enemies, but that doesn't mean I'd go around telling everybody your basement is a torture chamber."

Compton kept the nasty smile on as he crossed his arms. He looked like he was going to start laughing about something, but he didn't. "Because you refused to surrender your powers."

"Oh yeah, like I'm just gonna give up my power to someone like you!" Danny yelled. Why can't you just go away and leave me alone? What did I ever do to you!"

Compton remained silent for a while, but then he looked like he was charging some laser blaster built into his suit. Danny's eyes widened and he took a step back.

"Hey man, I'm not trying to cause any trouble. I just want to talk to you."

Compton seemed to ignore this. He looked like he had a blood-thirsty gaze in his eyes, the way a tiger looks when it's about to pounce onto a deer. Everything became quiet as Compton seemed to concentrate more and more on the weapon built into his arm.

"Look, I'm only trying to get things straight!" Danny yelled. "If you don't act like an idiot, we can get away from this without someone getting hurt!"

"Enough of this, Danny!" Compton yelled.

Compton hit a button and a thick blue beam fired from the cannon on his hunting suit's arm. Danny jumped out of the way just in time as the beam barely missed him.

Danny rolled onto the ground to dodge it and came back up with some dirt stuck to his suit. He looked civilized a moment before, but now he looked like he was ready to fight him to the death.

"Will you just listen to me for one second!" Danny screamed loud enough to scare all the birds in the area away. "Quit being such a moron! We can just end it now if you'll explain why you told everybody at my school I was part ghost!"

"You didn't surrender!" Compton yelled. "Now I will show you just how painfully wrong you were not to!"

Compton fired another blast, and once again Danny had to move to miss it. This time, he jumped in the air as he saw the laser pass right under him. He landed on the ground, this time more firmly.

"I guess we have no choice but to fight, don't we," Danny hissed. "Fine! If you want to fight me, I'll have to show you just how painfully wrong _you_ are!"

Danny fired a blast of ectoplasmic energy from his hand, but Compton pressed a button on his suit. Small jets started burning energy on the underside of the armor, allowing Compton to start hovering in the air.

He tried to surprise Danny by firing a blast, but Danny was one step ahead of him. He fired his own blast, and the two collided. They created a mini explosion of bright green when their paths crossed. It made a large dust cloud, and when it cleared, Compton lunged at Danny and tackled him to the ground.

Danny was hurt badly by the impact, but he kicked his legs in the air and threw Compton off of him. Compton was sent flying through the air and landed with a hard thud on the ground. But like Danny, it didn't take Compton long at all for him to get back up.

"Geez, that metal suit must weigh a ton," Danny said in disbelief. "How do you manage to move around smoothly like that!"

Compton didn't answer. He instead just launched another laser blast at Danny's head. It hit him right between the eyes, but for some reason, it didn't hurt a lot. Now enraged, Danny ran over to Compton and punched him several times in the face and then picked Compton up.

Danny was floating higher up and Compton could only hold on for the ride. When Danny was about fifty feet in the air, he dropped Compton. Compton plummeted to the ground, looking like a pile of flesh but no bones.

"Ha!" Danny yelled. "See? I'm the good guy, and the good guys always win!"

Danny's cocky expression immediately turned to one of complete shock. Compton was actually _getting up_ like nothing had happened.

"You just don't give up, do you?" Danny asked. "How high do you have to fall for you to give up?"

"I've never given up once in my life at something, Danny!" Compton raged. "There's no need for me to start now!"

"I think you need some mental help," Danny said to himself. Not wanting to hurt Compton any more than he already did, Danny ran off and headed towards the top of a tree.

He hid behind the leaves at the top of the tree, making it very difficult for Compton to be able to attack him. But Danny sadly forgot that Compton's suit had jetpacks, and when those jetpacks were activated, he destroyed all the branches guarding Danny.

Danny's eyes widened in horror as Compton aimed his laser cannon at Danny's head. At this close range, the blast would shatter Danny's head.

A wicked smile spread itself across Compton's face. "Got ya," he threatened.

Danny went intangible and passed right through to the bottom of the tree, causing the blast to harmlessly blow the end off the tip of the tree.

Danny landed on the ground and started running from Compton as quickly as he could. Compton fired blast after blast, trying to nail Danny and finish him off. Somehow, Danny managed to dodge them all and swooped up into the air.

He landed on the top of a building and tried to catch his breath for a moment. He sat down and breathed in heavily, hoping that Compton would eventually give up.

"Man, doesn't that guy know I don't want to fight?" he asked. "If I see him one more time, I'll…"

Danny was interrupted when Compton abruptly fired himself up from the ground and landed softly on top of the roof.

"Danny, you've given me enough trouble!" Compton yelled.

"You're one who should be talking," Danny remarked.

"Well, Danny, I think it's about time we ended this."

"Um…let's not and say we did, okay?"

Compton did not seem very thrilled with Danny's not wanting to fight. Both of them were on the flat roof of a building. The air was completely still and everything was quiet, even the birds.

"I like my idea more," Compton hissed. He fired another quick laser from his suit, and the only thing Danny could do was go intangible. He watched as the laser went right through him, exactly like he wasn't even there.

Compton got ready to fire his laser again. Instead of just dodging the blasts over and over, Danny decided to make a run for it this time. He turned his back and started running away. He ran to the edge of the rooftop and jumped off it, and then landed on the roof right next to it.

"You're not getting away that easy!" Compton yelled, once again igniting the jets on his ghost suit. He started hovering up in the air a few feet and then flew over to the roof Danny just jumped on, which was a little higher than the roof he had previously been on.

Just as he landed on the top of the rooftop, Compton fired another laser blast at him. This time, it hit Danny in the leg and knocked him on to the ground.

Compton began snickering as he floated on to the rooftop next to Danny and grabbed him by the throat. He gripped Danny by the throat as he started holding him over the edge of the building, obviously going to drop him.

"I have a way with getting myself into situations like this, don't I?" Danny asked himself as he looked at the ground, hundreds of feet below.

"Well, rest assured, this will be the last time that you are in this kind of situation, if you get my drift," Compton said.

"Yeah, but I think you're forgetting one tiny little detail," Danny said, with a mischievous smile beginning to appear on him.

"Oh yeah? And what detail is that?"

"That I'm a ghost and I can do this!" Danny yelled. He went intangible and passed right out Compton's grasp, and then disappeared right through the building.

"Hey!" Compton yelled after Danny disappeared and was now out of reach. "Get back here and fight!"

There was silence. Compton would have felt stupid kneeling on the roof and screaming through it if there was anybody else up there.

Compton got an unpleasant surprise when Danny shot up through the roof with his fist clenched. As soon as Danny popped through the roof, he gave Compton the hardest punch he could throw.

The impact and surprise pushed Compton backwards and back-flat on the square roof. While making some growling noises, he got up and stood in a solid position.

Compton then pressed a button on his suit. Instantly, it looked like an additional layer of armor was placed on top of the already existing layer. A helmet popped out from the suit and put itself on Compton, and then a stained blue glass window popped out of the helmet to protect Compton's face. The laser cannon on Compton's arm seemed to get bigger as it encased his entire arm, looking like it was capable of blowing through concrete. More jets popped out of his wings, but some also from under his feet.

Danny tried not to look nervous while Compton went into annihilation-mode. _"How come none of my parents' ghost hunting stuff did something like that?"_ he thought to himself.

After a second of stuttering, Danny took a solid stand and got ready. "Fine, you want me to come out and fight? I'll give you a fight you'll never forget!"


	18. Compton's Battle

The air had been stiff and peaceful just a few moments before. The sky barely had any clouds in it, and the trees seemed rather green. Birds were singing happily without a care in the world, and it was a safe bet that if it weren't for school, kids would be out either doing chores or hanging out with friends. All of the roads were empty, as this was the time when most people were at their jobs or school.

The peaceful environment could fool anybody, because very shortly, the air was filled with the sounds of laser blasts and explosions as two people (who were ironically neighbors) were battling on the top of the rooftops.

"Take…this!" Danny yelled. He shot out his hand and fired a blast of energy from it.

Mr. Compton, Danny's new neighbor, was Danny's adversary for this battle. He was in a ghost hunting suit he had made, being a ghost hunter himself. But Danny's parents' inventions were pale comparisons to the device Compton had. It looked like Compton's suit was powerful enough to blow away about ten ghosts at once.

The ray of energy hit Compton in the chest, but it didn't seem to do anything significant to Compton's bright blue metallic suit.

"You think you're so tough?" Compton snapped. "Think again!"

Compton pressed a button and a giant ball of light formed in the center of what looked like the heaviest laser cannon Danny could imagine. It was obviously going to fire some laser, and if it hit Danny, he would be turned to dust in less than a second.

"There's got to be a weak spot in that suit somewhere," Danny softly said as he looked at the beam getting ready to fire. "If I can find that spot, Mr. Compton's a sitting duck!"

Danny's trail of thought was interrupted when the beam fired. It was like a giant cylinder of concrete with a blinding white center and a blue lining. Danny had to duck, and it was a good thing he did.

When the laser passed, Danny turned around and saw it hit a hill a few hundred yards off in the distance. When the laser hit the hill, there was a giant explosion there that looked like someone had triggered a land mine.

"Holy smokes!" Danny yelled. "That thing's got enough power to demolish the Great Wall of China!"

Compton seemed very infuriated that the ray missed Danny, and he pressed a button that caused it to start charging up again.

"I _really_ need to find the weak spot on that ghost suit," Danny said. "If I don't find it, I'm toast!...actually, I'll be lucky to just be toast if I get hit by _that_ thing."

Danny tried flying around as Compton got his laser charged up. Then, Danny saw something that he thought would give him an advantage.

"His faceplate!" Danny yelled. "If I hit the glass protecting Compton's face, it'll smash and distract him enough for me to deal the finishing blows."

As Compton fired the thick laser, Danny fired his own at the stained blue window protecting Compton's face. But to Danny's unpleasant surprise, his ectoplasmic ray bounced _back_ and hit him, just as Compton fired his devastating beam.

The ray hit Danny, therefore throwing him backwards. Normally, he'd consider that bad, but based on the circumstances, that was the luckiest thing that could have happened. Because when Danny got thrown back by his own blast after it deflected off of Compton's faceplate, Compton fired his laser beam. The beam would have hit Danny if he didn't get knocked back by his own blast.

"Okay, no more Mr.-Nice-Guy!" Danny yelled once he got up. But as he looked around, he still couldn't see where the suit's weak spot was. Danny decided to just ignore it and instead flew back down to the square top of one of the buildings.

"Uh-uh-uhhhhhhhh," Compton said like he was a parent scolding a bad child. "No running from this one!"

Compton put down his giant cannon and it got replaced by two smaller cannons, one on each arm. He started firing the blasts alternately at Danny as he ran across the roof. Just like in the movies, all the blasts came within an inch of Danny as he was running across the roof.

"Okay, this is bad," Danny said to himself when he came to the end of the roof. He couldn't just jump off it and fly away, because that could only make him an easier target for Compton if he was floating in mid air.

When Danny came to the end, he quickly turned around and ran towards Compton. He leapt in the air with his fist clenched and punched Compton's faceplate. Of course, that only made Danny smash his hand.

"Gahhh!" he screamed in pain as he clenched his throbbing hand.

"Heh heh heh heh heh," Compton said. "Perhaps firing a blast at me didn't convince you that I'm completely invincible?" he asked.

Danny groaned, but he felt weakened now that his hand was hurting pretty badly. But he couldn't let that distract him, because he was going to die at Compton's hands if he allowed that to happen.

Danny then made the move of running off the building and allowing himself to float down to the ground. When he landed, he ran over to a stop sign and pulled it out of the ground. He then flew up into the air with it and held it like a battle axe as he stared at Compton.

"What do you hope to do with that?" Compton yelled with a cocky smile on his face.

"This!" Danny yelled. He swung the stop sign as hard as he could and tried to nail Compton in the head with it. It worked when Compton screamed in pain and made a dent in the armor.

At first, Danny was happy to see that the armor was invincible to ghostly energy but vulnerable to other solids, but there was no way he'd have the strength to swing the stop sign enough to break the suit, especially with Compton retaliating.

"…and this!"

Danny turned the stop sign around and stuck the steel end into part of the suit. Instantly, small sparks started jumping from the suit, and in a feminine robotic voice, the suit said "WARNING: LASER MALFUNCTION. WARNING: LASER MALFUNCTION"

"Ha!" Danny yelled. "Not so high and might without that laser, are you?"

"Fine then!" Compton yelled. "I guess we'll have to take this fight to close-combat instead!"

Compton charged up his rocket boosters and launched himself towards Danny, throwing a punch right into Danny's jaw. And since Compton's fist was protected by the metal armor of his high-tech jumpsuit, it was bound to hurt even more.

Danny was knocked back a few feet and started rubbing the part of his mouth where Compton struck him, but it didn't take long for him to get back into the fight.

"Okay then," Danny yelled, "how about THIS?" Danny charged up his ectoplasmic laser and pointed it Compton's wing. Theoretically, Danny thought that if the wing was broken, Compton couldn't fly. And he also saw that the lasers had broken, which hinted to him that the suit wasn't completely indestructible like he assumed it was at first.

But, when Danny fired his laser at Compton's wing, it didn't seem to do anything. Once again, the laser just bounced off the wing and came shooting back at him. (Luckily, Danny was prepared to dodge it this time)

"Danny, don't you see?" Compton yelled. "There is no possible way you can win! Surrender to me now!"

"Have you read any books or seen any movies where the snobby bad guy says that?" Danny questioned. "Because if you have, you know that they end up dead about ten seconds later."

"But this isn't real, is it, Danny!" Compton yelled. "This is real!"

Compton fired up his jets once again and started flying towards Danny like a comet. Danny jumped out of the way just in time, but Compton had way too much momentum to stop. He ended up flying off the end of the building.

Danny was shocked to think that Compton would plummet to the ground and die. Not too surprisingly though, Compton fired up the rockets on his battle suit once more and was now floating without being over anything except the ground hundreds of feet below him.

"Ugh…you dying or using your ghost suit to save your life so you can keep fighting me: I can't decide which is worse," Danny said.

"You won't have to worry about deciding much longer," Compton said.

"Okay, you gotta say at least _something_ original," Danny commanded.

Tired of Danny's remarks, Compton flew over and landed right next to Danny on the roof of the building. He then punched the roof and part of it started to break in.

Seeing the strength in Compton's suit capable of crushing a concrete ceiling to an office building really surprised Danny, and he even jumped backwards a little from it.

Compton continued smashing the roof until it gave in and crumpled like dust under both of them. Both of them started falling, but both of them were apparently thinking alike.

The roof fell to the floor below of the building, with huge chunks of it shattering into smaller pieces. However, both Danny and Compton started floating about half way down.

Compton, upset to see that Danny didn't fall to the ground and either die or get hurt really badly, started formulating a new plan.

Compton shot over to Danny and grabbed the back of his head.

"Hey, what are ya doing!" Danny yelled.

Compton began smashing Danny's head into the wall as violently as he could. When Danny was still dizzy from the blasts, Compton flew to the ground and picked up a giant slab on concrete that had fallen from the roof when he smashed it in.

Obviously, Compton was going to crush Danny's head with the slab of concrete. Danny came back to his senses just in time to see this about to happen. (Which was about the same time when the concrete would have hit him)

"Whoa, watch it with that thing!" Danny yelled. He threw his hands up and started applying counterforce to Compton as they both tried pushing the block of concrete towards each other.

"This is the end for you, Danny!" Compton yelled, using every ounce of strength he and his ghost suit had to put into the fight.

"Come on, that's all you've been saying for the past few days," Danny complained, still trying his best to prevent his head being crushed by the slab of cement. "Can't you find something new to say?"

Compton didn't respond at all, and the standoff continued. Finally, Danny got the upper hand and threw both the cement slab and Compton away. Both of them fell against the opposite wall.

As Compton smashed against the other wall, he quickly fell to the floor below. Danny took this opportunity to escape as quickly as he could. He flew out of the giant gash in the ceiling and was now free again.

Meanwhile, Compton groaned angrily as he got up from the floor and looked out to see Danny had escaped. Growling, he fired up the jetpacks on his ghost suit and flew through the hole in the ceiling.

Danny was still on the ceiling, hoping Compton would have given up. One could imagine his disappointment to find that Compton was now back and not about to give in.

"You just don't give up, do you?" Danny asked. He stood up and got in his fighting stance, but oddly enough, Compton stayed floating in the air. And Danny could soon see why.

Compton flew off the edge of the building and steered himself towards another building. He bashed in a piece of that roof and pulled out a concrete slab that that roof had created after he punched it in.

Danny flew over to the other building, and just as Compton threw it, Danny put a shield up around himself. The slab of concrete bounced off of him as if it was rubber, and Danny let the shield down after that.

Annoyed, Compton took off and started flying at Danny as fast as he could, the rocket boosters on his suit sounding furious.

Instinctively, Danny fired a blast of energy as soon as he saw Compton charging at him. Compton tried to dodge it, but he miscalculated slightly. He turned to the side, and the blast ended up striking the rocket boosters on his wing. Luckily, the boosters were able to be destroyed.

The other boosters started stuttering from one of them being destroyed, and in just moments, they all failed.

A look of panic revealed itself on Compton's face when it happened. He instantly started tumbling to the ground, hundreds of feet below.

Danny watched in horror as this event unfolded. After what seemed like the longest time, Compton completed his fall and landed face-flat on the pavement, rebounding a little at the time of impact.

Danny gasped, then immediately flew downwards to see if Compton was all right. When he landed, he saw Compton was lying flat across the ground with his back side showing. Danny turned Compton over and just saw an empty stare. The suit seemed completely mangled, and the glass protecting Compton's face was shattered. There was quite a bit of blood on the inside of the helmet.

Danny was breathless as he stared into Compton's eyes. Everything went quiet, and the only sound that could be heard was the stuttering of Danny's breath. The streets were still empty, which was good because Danny didn't want anyone around him to see what had just happened.

As Danny looked at Compton's eyes, Danny thought Compton was dead. But Compton's eyes started flickering a little, and he turned them towards Danny, not saying a word.

"Mr. Compton!" Danny yelled, almost overjoyed to see his neighbor hadn't died. "Oh man, are you all right!"

Compton didn't say anything other than a few groans. He used every ounce of strength he had left in him after that fall to pull his arm upwards. Danny was completely silent, thinking Compton was okay.

Compton pushed a small button on his ghost hunting suit, and a small claw fired itself out of a hidden compartment inside of it. The claw immediately stuck itself into Danny, and Danny felt like he had everything being torn out from inside of him.

Danny fell over onto the ground when the claw stuck itself into him. He began screaming loudly and throbbed in pain. After a few seconds, he automatically transformed out of his ghost self and back into his human form. He looked like he had to exercise for nine hours straight when he changed back. His skin was dirty and there was a ton of sweat across his forehead. His clothes almost looked like he had just went swimming with them on.

"Hey! What the?..." he stammered.

The claw was now holding what appeared to be a black jumpsuit very similar to the one he had on when he went ghost. But there was something weird about it…there was a glow of ectoplasmic green around it.

Compton made a soft smile when he saw what the claw had done, but then his head just collapsed on the pavement. His eyes closed and his breathing stopped. He was obviously dead now.

Danny tried to take in everything that just happened. All he knew now was that Compton was dead and that the claw that had stuck itself into Danny just did something to him.

After trying to think things true, he just reached out and tried to touch the jumpsuit-like thing that the claw had just pulled out of him. But just as his hand would have touched it, he heard a snickering from above.

Danny looked up and he saw a charcoal black figure with glowing white eyes floating above him. Even though he looked like a moving sculpture of burnt wood, Danny could tell it was a ghost by the glowing field of black energy around it.

The figure grabbed the claw, and the jumpsuit came with it. "Ha!" The figure yelled. "Now I have your powers! You're helpless now, Ghost Child!"

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled, getting up. He had to watch his step, now that he apparently didn't have any more of his powers. Danny tried transforming just to make sure the figure wasn't lying, but unfortunately, he wasn't. Danny had truly just had his powers taken from him. "Who are you?" Danny asked.

The all-black ghost started chuckling. "My name is Count Xissil van Horrick," he said.

Danny's jaw dropped. "So…Compton was serious when he said you weren't dead? But that person in your mansion…that wasn't a decoy or something?"

"No!" Horrick snapped. He was burnt black from the last time he and Danny had met. "Now I have your powers, and you will finally get what you deserve!"

Horrick took the claw with the black jumpsuit and started flying away. He was stopped when Danny screamed, "Wait! Where do you think you're going!"

Horrick stopped. He turned back and looked at Danny coldly.

"Give me back my powers!" Danny yelled.

"I will," Horrick promised. "You want your powers? Come and get them, as soon as you're feeling brave and ready to die!"


	19. Heating Up

Danny was now in a lot of trouble. He was powerless, and because of that, he was also scared. Yes, he may have won the battle against Compton, but Compton's final act of life was to do Horrick's duties, which was to steal Danny's ghost powers.

Now Horrick had Danny's power, and there was no telling what was going to happen now. Was Horrick going to use the powers to enhance himself? Most likely. Now what could Danny do? He could still head down to Horrick's mansion to steal his powers back.

But there was so much risk in that plan. Not only did Danny no longer have his powers, but his parents still had not made any new ghost hunting equipment and had since thrown all of it away. Things looked pretty bleak.

Sighing more depressed than he ever had before, Danny sat down on the ground and cuddled up into a ball. "What am I going to do?" he kept asking himself out loud. Since there was no one around, he didn't mind talking to himself. "I can't just go marching into Horrick's mansion. I'll be lucky if I come out with all ten fingers if I try that."

The air around him seemed quiet and peaceful, allowing him to relax a little more. He was scrambling his brain to think of how he could sneak into Horrick's mansion and get his ghostly defenses back, but he knew it wasn't going to be that easy. The most logical thought would be to turn to another ghost hunter.

But who could he turn to? His parents didn't have any more equipment for him to use, and Mrs. Compton definitely wasn't going to let him have any. He hit a dead end no matter which way he went.

Now, Danny had another decision to make: where would he go now? He couldn't go back to school without getting caught, and he couldn't go home. He decided it would be best to go hide somewhere hidden where he could relax and think about his next move.

Ultimately, Danny went to the stream where he had slept a few nights earlier. He came up with a few ideas there, but decided to stay there until school was over and he would get home at his normal time. That entire time of staying at the stream he didn't think of anything.

When the time finally came for Danny to go back home, he ran as fast as he could. He was worried about what he was going to do, and they were the only adults he felt comfortable talking to.

"Mom! Dad!" Danny yelled, bursting through the doors to his home. He looked a little worn out from the running he just did, but somehow found a way to ignore it.

"Danny? What's wrong?" Maddie asked.

"Remember that Horrick guy who captured you guys and Sam and Tucker and Jazz?" Danny asked.

"How could I forget him!" Jack screamed, getting up. He started pounding his fist into his palm. "If I ever see that ghost again, I'll stuff his…"

"Jack!" Maddie yelled, stopping her husband dead in his tracks.

Jack stopped talking and quietly slumped back down onto the couch, where he was sitting before Danny ran inside.

"Anyway, I thought I finished the guy up when I freed you guys from that giant ball," Danny explained. "He got set on fire and fell down into a pile of chemicals and turned into a giant fireball. But somehow he survived it, and now he's got my powers and…"

"Wait a minute!" Jack yelled, interrupting again. "How did he get your powers?"

"Oh yeah…Compton and I got into this giant fight. To make a long story short, it ended with Compton falling off a building and dying."

Jack and Maddie's faces filled with horror after hearing that Compton had died.

"Guys, hold on a second!" Danny insisted. "Right before he died, he pressed a button on his ghost hunting suit and this claw thing fired out of it and stuck itself into me."

Maddie shrieked. "Are you hurt!"

"Actually, it didn't actually hurt too badly," he said in a casual voice. "But it sucked all my powers out, and then Horrick came down looking like a moving statue made of coal and took my powers away once Compton pulled them out."

Jack began to look very worried. "Well, did you get your powers back?"

"Nope," Danny said, looking down at the floor and shaking his head. "That's why I came to you guys. Would either of you know any way that I could sneak into Horrick's mansion to get them back?"

"Sneak into his mansion!" Maddie shrieked. "Absolutely not! He's dangerous now. If you're going, then your father and I are coming with you!"

"No you aren't!" Danny shouted back.

Maddie and Jack had surprised looks on their faces. None of them expected Danny to do that, not even Danny himself. Danny was stunned by how aggressive he had just become.

Danny sighed. His eyes began to fill with sorrow. "I'm sorry, but I can't put you guys in that kind of danger again." Danny didn't know whether or not he was apologizing for the outburst or for saying he was going to go alone and without their help. "If you want to help me, the most you can do is make me a weapon to help me fight him."

Neither Jack nor Maddie said anything. They looked at each other, then Jack looked like he had something. However, he looked like he thought he was really going to regret saying it.

"Danny, we still have _one_ last thing you can take with you in to fight," he said.

"Really?" Danny asked.

"The Fenton vehicle that we have for ghost zone travel," Jack said. "We still have that."

"Awesome!" Danny burst with excitement. "Can I take it in there now and find Horrick, blow up his mansion and get my powers back?"

"Hold on, Danny," Jack said. "It's not going to be that easy. I've removed all the weapons and defenses from it, so you've only got a vehicle. I was going to wait until sometime next week until I began dismantling the whole thing."

Danny deflated.

"But yes, Danny, I'm going to let you take the car into the ghost zone and try to get your powers back."

Maddie's eyes widened. "Jack!"

"Maddie, I know you're worried about Danny, but who's going to get his powers back if he can't? I have faith in our son; he may not be the best student, but I'll bet he's a darn good ghost hunter and fighter, just like his old man!"

"Um, yeah, let's go with that," Danny said. "Anyway, thank you so much dad! I promise I'll be careful!"

Danny ran down into the basement and saw the car sitting there. True to his father's words, all the weapons and defenses had been stripped from the vehicle, so it was really nothing more than a pile of metal that could be piloted.

Danny strapped himself into the machine and looked around his basement one last time before he started up the engines and activated the portal.

"All right," Danny said, "here we go."

He pushed one more button and he was automatically in control of the vehicle as it belted out of the portal and into the Ghost Zone. "Watch out, Horrick, because here I come!"

Actually, Danny was hoping he wouldn't have to fight Horrick. At least, not until he got his powers back. Danny had shown on more than one occasion that Horrick was a pushover when Danny had his powers, so all he had to do was find him and beat Horrick to a pulp.

The flight to the Horrick's mansion was surprisingly short. Danny didn't pay any attention to anything around him. He was way too focused on what was going to happen next to care what was happening anywhere else.

Danny finally landed in front of Horrick's mansion. He parked the car and hopped out of it. He stared at the massive house in front of him. His powers were somewhere inside that house, he thought. And he wasn't about to stop at anything to get them back.

After a quick breath in, Danny walked over to the front doors. He had been in this mansion enough now; he hoped that this would be the last time he'd have to go in.

But just as Danny went over to the door to open it, the doors burst open. Danny was staring right into the face of Count Xissil Van Horrick as that happened.

Danny gasped. Horrick smiled. He still looked like a giant chunk of walking ash. But his grin still looked nasty enough to give an elderly person a heart attack.

"You may have killed my daughter and made quick work of Compton," Horrick said, "But like I said, even if you were able to dispatch of Aria and Compton, you will have no chance against me."

"Please!" Danny yelled. "You're probably the easiest out of all of them! I've already fought you two or three times and you were done in about thirty seconds every time."

"Well, that was then, and this is now," Horrick said.

"Hey, how'd you even turn to that shade of black?" Danny asked. "Because I would definitely sue whichever network held the rights to the makeover show you went on."

"Do you even have to ask?" Horrick wondered. "Fine, if you must know. Do you recall when I was trying to sever the link between us?"

"How could I forget?"

"Remember how I sliced my arm open to prove to you that we indeed felt the same pain?"

"Once again, how could I forget?"

"And do you recall that fight we had before you set your loved ones free?"

"Just cut to the chase already!" Danny screamed.

"Fine," Horrick growled. "As you remember, the fight ended with you accidentally setting me on fire with the gas hose. Well, luckily for me, the first place the fire came into was that giant gash in my arm when I sliced it open. When that happened, the fire traveled all throughout my body and charred all the molecules that make me up."

"Is that why you look so burned?" Danny asked. "The fire did that to you?"

"No. I look charred because that fire ENHANCED me."

"Okay, you've totally lost me," Danny said in a non-caring way.

Horrick growled, obviously not knowing why he was explaining everything. "The fire has made my molecules accustomed to it! Fire is now part of my being!"

"Wait a minute," Danny said, starting to sound a little nervous. "Are you saying fire can't weaken you now?"

"Weaken me!" Horrick screamed with a loud laugh mixed in. "Quite the opposite, Danny! Fire doesn't weaken me now; it makes me all the more powerful!"

Horrick tossed his arms in the air, and just like at rock concerts, two massive pillars of fire popped up around him, burning the air around both of them. The cackling of fire and its roaring drowned out any sounds of shock that Danny made.

Horrick stopped the fire uproar and looked at Danny the same way a hunter looks at a deer when he's about to shoot it.

"With this new power, nothing can stop me!" Horrick yelled. "Not even you!"

Horrick pointed his hands at Danny. Out of habit, Danny ducked out of the way. And it was a good thing, because Horrick fired a solid beam of fire right at him. Danny watched as the fire made the air around it look like a liquid and as it made the air feel thirty degrees hotter.

As soon as the fire cleared, Danny realized he had no hope of getting his powered without being barbecued. He ran over to the vehicle his parents let him fly into the Ghost Zone and hopped in. He started the engines up and flew away from Horrick's mansion as quickly as he could.

"That's right, run!" Horrick screamed as he watched Danny fly away. "You'll come crying back for your powers eventually, and when you do, I'll be ready!"

Danny just flew away with his back pressed hard into the chair.

"Man, that guy's insane!" Danny exclaimed breathlessly. "He's going to make Dario from _Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow_ look like a firecracker."

Danny had nowhere to fly now but home. He was really worried, because Horrick knew where Danny lived, and if he ever found his way out of the Ghost Zone, Horrick would probably come and toast everyone Danny knew, as well as probably Danny himself.

The rest of the ride, all Danny did was think about what he could do to possibly stand up against Horrick's newfound power. Yes, he had been up against huge power before, but fire was a completely different experience to him. Fire could spread easily, and it caught on someone, it would kill them slowly and painfully. And if it didn't kill them, it would certainly scar them for the rest of their lives.

How the heck was Danny going to stand up against _that_, especially when he didn't have any power to defend himself?


	20. Preparing For The End

Horrick's power had grown practically inhuman. At least, that's what it seemed like fire-wise. Now that the fire from when he was ignited in his third fight with Danny got into his open gash and literally fired up all his molecules, Horrick seemed like a walking, talking volcano. The worst part is that with no ghost hunting equipment or powers, Danny would barely last any time at all in battle against him.

As Danny piloted the vehicle back through the portal, he was gripping the steering wheel with more pressure than anything he had ever squeezed anything with before. He was dead silent the entire ride back; he didn't do as much as talk to himself.

When the car passed through the portal and back into his basement, Danny hopped out. For some reason, he didn't feel safe at all in his house. He thought he was no better off in the confines of his house than he was at the front of Horrick's mansion. It was a very disturbing feeling, and Danny hated it.

The first thing the fourteen-year old did was run up the stairs and to talk to his parents about what was going on.

"…and so, Horrick pretty much can shoot fire from anywhere and it looks hot enough to melt a building," Danny said, wrapping it up.

The room went quiet as clear expressions of fear and worry appeared on Danny's parents. It was a long silence, and it seemed awkward to the extent that Danny had to ask himself if he made the smart decision by telling his parents what was going on. Maybe he just gave _them_ more things to worry about.

Jack was the first one to get up. The fear soon turned into determination for him. Acting like he was getting up to beat someone up who gave him trouble in school, he marched his way down into the basement.

"Wait. Dad, what are you doing?" Danny asked, following his father to the start of the stairs but not following him down.

"I'm going back on my word for just this once," Jack said in a way similar to people when they're about to risk a lot of money on a game show.

"Wait? You're what? I don't get it."

"I'm going back on my word!" Jack responded, turning around and looking at Danny at the top of the stairs. "I said I wouldn't make ghost hunting equipment anymore. But if you don't have your powers or anything to defend yourself against that maniac!"

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled. "You're going to make me a weapon or something."

"I'm not making you a weapon," Jack said. "I'm making you a suit that's resistant to fire. It's the only way you can stand up against Horrick now. At least, that's what it sounds like."

A faint smile started to show itself on Danny. "Thanks, dad."

"Hey, don't think I'm doing this all on my own, son," Jack said in a gentle way as he cracked a smile. "You're the one who's going to be fighting Horrick. Don't you think you should be giving me some hints on what the suit should have?"

Danny let out a small chuckle. "Yeah, I guess so."

And so the two set to work. They pulled out a piece of paper and started sketching possible combinations for attacks and defenses on the suit that Danny would be fighting Horrick in. After all, if this was going to be the last stance against him, the suit had better be good and be able to take a beating.

Jack and Danny agreed very early on that they would have to make the sidings to the suit very solid and not melt from fire, but not conduct heat, either. When the outline was finished and the frame of the suit was built, Danny and Jack began talking about what should be equipped.

"Since he's now mostly made of fire, I think it would be a smart idea to put some water cannons in the suit," Danny suggested. "Even if the water doesn't hurt him, it should at least weaken the intensity of his fires."

"I like you're thinking, Danny!" Jack complemented, giving his son a pat on the back that felt more like a slam.

Jack promptly added some water canisters to the design of the suit. The two worked on the suit for the longest time, gathering tools and machines that they were going to need to make sure the suit was as strong as it could be.

Danny and Jack easily spent half the night smelting things together and adding things to the suit, hoping that it would be enough to kick Horrick's flaming butt. After several hours of working at it, the suit was finally completed.

The suit that was just made for a fight with Horrick looked like it would perfectly fit Danny, and Danny only. The sidings were metallic blue, and it had a window in the front of it so Danny could see out of it. On the back were two giant containers that pumped water to cannons on each of the arms.

"All right, this thing looks awesome!" Danny said with excitement showing in his voice. "Horrick's gonna be paying for messing with me once I confront him in this thing! Thanks, dad!"

"You're welcome Danny," Jack said. He was smiling wide, but just by looking at him and the way his voice sounded, you'd be able to tell he was nervous about Danny going to confront Horrick.

Danny put the suit on and walked over to the portal. He opened it up and stared into the swirling green spiral that would transport him to the other dimension. He turned around for a brief second to look at his dad. Jack was obviously nervous, but he seemed to have confidence in Danny.

"I think you've taken on tougher opponents than Horrick before," Jack encouraged. "He'll be a pushover compared to your other enemies."

Danny gave a faint smile and nodded. He gave his dad a quick salute and then turned back to the portal. With his new suit making loud clanking sounds, he stepped through and into the abyss of the Ghost Zone.

Danny steered his way through all the obstacles and annoyances and went to the mansion where Horrick resided. Danny hoped it would be the last time he'd have to go there. He also hoped it would be the last time he'd have to confront Horrick.

When Danny landed on the front step of the mansion, he banged on the door as hard as possible. Horrick went to answer it, and a wicked grin showed through when he opened the door.

"You're ready to die?" Horrick hissed.

"Open your eyes, dude," Danny bluntly said. "I've got a new suit that's resistant to fire and is armed with water jets that'll turn you to a pile of smoldering ash!"

"Impressive," Horrick said, studying the suit. "Let's see how fireproof it is."

Horrick fired a long stream of fire from his hand and aimed it directly at the center of the suit's torso. Danny didn't feel any pain or any heat conduction, but when he looked down, he thought he saw the suit looking a little more like a liquid.

"See?" Danny said. "Nothing! Now give me my powers back or you're going out!" Danny pointed the cannon on his left arm right at Horrick's head.

Horrick didn't do anything besides laugh at the threat. "I can't give you back your powers. If I did, you'd be able to crush me like a bug."

"That's right!" Danny yelled. "But I'll go easy on you if you give up now!"

"Let me think about that for a second," Horrick said, putting his finger to his chin. "Um…no!"

Horrick held out his hand again and fired another stream of fire from it. Danny jumped out of the way just in time. He fell on the ground with his metal suit making a lot of noise as it hit the soil around Horrick's mansion.

"Fine then!" Danny yelled. "How about this!"

Danny put out both his arms and fired water from the cannons on his arms at Horrick. The water was coming out at a very high speed, and not only did it seem to be doing a lot of physical pain to Horrick, but it also seemed to be creating a large amount of steam to rise from him as well.

Danny stopped spraying Horrick for a moment and took pleasure in seeing Horrick look like he was in a little bit of pain.

"Okay, okay!" Horrick yelled. "Your powers are in my mansion!"

"I'm glad to see you came to your senses," Danny sneered. He ran inside with his metal suit clanking loud enough to give some people a headache.

As Danny ran in, he started going through every single room he could remember, seeing if his powers were anywhere in sight. After going into every room he could see, he began throwing everything around and looking for what could possibly be his ghost half. The hard part was that he didn't know _what_ he was looking for. He didn't know if his powers were in some sort of a container or were being overlapped with growing green ectoplasma, making it easy for him to identify them.

The search continued for a long time, and Danny still had no luck. "Errrghh…why did Horrick have to make his house so big! I'm surprised he doesn't get lost in it!"

Meanwhile, Horrick was standing outside of the mansion, looking in at it. He started laughing softly to himself.

"Danny, surely you don't think I'd give in this easily when I have this kind of power?" He then went over to his house and he put out his hands. He started laughing evilly as he sprayed his house with his fires. He was setting his own house on fire, and as he sprayed it more and more, his laugh became louder and more intimidating.

In no time, fire was around the sides of the walls and it was closing in quickly.

"Such a shame that Danny doesn't know that even my own fire can give me additional strength," Horrick added. He then walked inside his house as it was aflame. He just stayed at the entrance and started launching fire everywhere in the room on anything that was flammable. "Let's see how well Danny gets out of this one."

Meanwhile, Danny was still looking around desperately for his powers. He didn't have much luck finding them, nor did he even figure out that he was inside a burning building for a while.

"Hey, is it me, or is it starting to get really hot in here?" Danny asked himself. He then perked his nose up a little, and he smelled something. "Hey, is that…smoke?"

Danny stopped looking for his powers and instead started scurrying through the house. He was scared that maybe it was on fire, and it wasn't long before he realized that his fears had become reality.

Danny opened up one of the doors and saw that there was a massive fire starting to spread around the entire house. Danny knew he would be toast if he stayed in that room, even with his suit on.

"Oh man, I gotta get out of here!" Danny realized. He started bolting for the way out of the house and ran to the entrance as quickly as he could. It was hard galloping with the heavy suit on, but Danny ignored it the best he could. Several times he had to duck as a random flame popped up occasionally right in front of him.

Danny continued running and tried to make his way towards the entrance. He was sure he'd be able to find his powers in the rubble and ash that was left when the fire was out. Right now, it was all about saving himself.

But Danny got a really nasty surprise when he went to the room that had the front entrance as the main way out. The entire room no longer looked dark and grim, but now burning red. There was fire all over the walls, and parts of the ceiling were collapsing from the heat. And standing right in front of the door was Horrick, looking very angry.

"Look, if you wanted to reenact the end of the Disney version of Robin Hood, couldn't you have at least waited until I was out of the house!" Danny screamed.

Horrick didn't say anything, but it certainly looked like all the fire around him was giving him a bit more strength. "What!" Horrick screamed. "How can you still be alive? Why are you still here!"

"Why do you think?" Danny yelled, doing his best to ignore the massive flames that were in the enclosed area around them. "I'm looking for my powers! You know, the ones you convinced Mr. Compton to help you steal?"

Horrick was snarling. "You fool! Your powers aren't in here! I was merely trying to finish you off!"

"What?" Danny yelled.

"I was trying to trap you in here and burn you to a crisp!" Horrick admitted. "But since you're stubborn to the very end, I'll have to do the job myself!"

Danny put up his fists like he was in a sparring match. He was really ticked at Horrick now and wasn't going to be afraid to show it.

Now Danny and Horrick were ready to fight. However, this was going to be a hard fight for Danny, mostly because he was stuck in one room that was on fire and giving in as he was fighting in it. And he didn't know exactly how strong his dad made the framing of the suit to resist fire.

Horrick looked like he was ready to rip someone's head off as he stared at Danny. He said through grit teeth, "I've had enough of you meddling in my plans and ruining my life! I will finish you right here and now!"


	21. Horrick's Battle

Thank you to Leppers, Jenna Dax timydamonkey, Whispers of Darkness and GoingGhost for reviewing this story. I really appreciated getting reviews from all five of you guys, but I got asked a question by Whispers about where Danny's powers were. In case that was serious or you didn't pick up on it, you're not _supposed_ to know where they are yet. Horrick told Danny his powers were in the mansion, but that was just a lie to trap Danny in there and set the house on fire and hopefully kill him. Sorry if that caused any confusion. You'll learn where Danny's powers really are at some point.

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Danny and Horrick stared at each other. Without his powers, Danny had to rely completely on his newly completed ghost suit for protection. Horrick now looked completely black all over, like he was stuck in a chimney. He had small flames surrounding the sides of his body.

The entire scene of the battle just had death written all over it for Danny. He was in an enclosed room that was going up in flames. And unfortunately for him, the fire only seemed to make Horrick stronger. Danny truthfully had his doubts about who was going to win this fight.

"Okay, let's get this thing started, shall we!" Danny yelled. He put out both of his arms and pointed the water cannons on them right at Horrick.

He fired the water from the cannons, and a high-pressure spray shot out of the cannons. It looked like Horrick was going to suffer a little bit from it, but Horrick put up a circular shield of fire around himself, creating a hot red sphere that the water couldn't penetrate. The water just evaporated when it got to close to the fire shield.

"Ha!" Horrick yelled. "That ruins your plans, doesn't it!"

"Don't worry; I got plenty more of them!" Danny threatened. He then jumped into the air (but not very high, since the suit was really weighing him down) and tried to kick Horrick in the face.

Horrick just grabbed Danny's foot as he tried kicking him and began spinning him around. After brewing up a lot of potential energy while spinning Danny around, Horrick threw Danny against a wall in the mansion. Danny hit the wall hard and a huge chunk of smoldering ceiling fell right into Danny's lap when that happened.

Danny tried to regain consciousness, and he did it just in time. As he looked up, Horrick had prepared a giant fireball in his hand and he threw it at Danny like a baseball pitcher throwing some heat. (no pun intended)

Danny rolled out of the way and the fireball hit the wall, creating a giant hole in it. The fire went through the wall the same way acid would go through paper.

"Nice try!" Danny screamed. He jumped up and once again started firing his heavy water cannons at Horrick.

Horrick didn't have time to react, and he got hit right in his midsection with the forceful sprays of freezing water. He groaned loudly as the water slammed him onto the ground. It looked like some steam was starting to rise from him.

"Steam!" Danny said softly. "That must mean he's getting weakened! All I have to do is keep spraying him until he's out like a fire."

Danny tried doing this, but he was distracted when part of the ceiling gave in above him and crashed on his head. The unexpected crushing of the ceiling caused Danny to collapse on the ground, therefore making him stop firing the water cannons.

Taking advantage of this, Horrick got up and ran into a fire brewing in the corner of the room. He was getting his strength back as he stood in the raging flame.

After standing in there for a few seconds, Horrick came out as if nothing had ever happened to him. He walked over to Danny as he tried to get up, but Horrick just fired a heavy amount of fire at him.

Although the suit Danny was wearing didn't conduct too much heat, Danny felt as if something was wrong with it. He was starting to feel the intense heat of the fire more and more, and he did his best to get up and out of the way of Horrick's attacks.

Danny shot up from the ground and was back on his two feet, but not for long. Horrick put both of his arms up in the air and a giant pillar of fire appeared right in front of Danny.

Danny started trying to run away from the fire pillar, but as soon as he turned around to start running, another pillar popped where he had been standing literally a second before. Basically, if he stayed there, he would have been barbecued.

Danny continued making quick runs as giant pillars of fire shot up from the ground that he had just been standing on. The fire had stretched up to the ceiling and was making it even more unstable. Danny kept a nervous eye on the ceiling, because it looked like it was about to give in.

Horrick stopped launching fire pillars and looked like it was starting to tire him out. Danny was also pretty exhausted, especially after having to run around in a giant metal suit that took extra muscle to move.

But Danny knew that if he stopped for one second, he'd be at a disadvantage. He soon realized that no matter how hard he sprayed Horrick, Horrick would always jump right back to a fire in the ignited room and regenerate himself. A new approach would have to be taken.

Instead of spraying Horrick, Danny pointed his water cannons up at the ceiling. He started spraying the high-pressured water at the collapsing plaster above them.

Horrick looked up and saw that part about to fall on top of him. He let out a loud, long scream as the chunk of ceiling disembarked itself and smashed itself on his face. The plaster split into several small pieces as it landed right on top of him. He fell on the ground on his back.

"Look what you've done, Horrick!" Danny yelled with a cocky look, "you're once proud mansion is crumpling around you. Or should I say, ON you?"

Horrick pushed the dry, hot plaster off his face and got up again. Even after being beat the way he had been, he still looked like he had enough strength to stop an oncoming freight train. Danny was nervous that maybe Horrick was on the verge of impossible to defeat. The suit Danny and his dad had made didn't seem to be doing a lot of good.

"All right!" Danny yelled, "If you want to keep fighting, we will! You get your strength from fire, right! Then I'll just have to put that fire out!"

Danny looked in the corner of the room and started firing his heavy water jets at the flames roaring in the further away parts. The water came out and killed the fire it came into contact with.

Horrick got very nervous of this and knew Danny was cutting off his power supply. He was forsaking his fire attacks and instead tried his best to tackle Danny and to deal some more physical attacks.

But Danny could sense Horrick was jumping right behind him, and he jolted around and fired his heavy water cannons at Horrick as he hurdled himself through the air. Horrick got sent flying backwards after being struck with the duo of heavy-pressure water cannons. He smashed against a wall in the back of the room and was temporarily unable to move.

Meanwhile, Danny turned back to all the extra fire in the room and he started spraying it. He was secretly enjoying putting out all of the fire, knowing that his enemy was losing his power as the fire died.

"Wow, I can see why so many kids want to be firemen," Danny remarked to himself after he just put out fire after fire.

Soon, half the fire in the room had been reverted to nothing except steam that disappeared in the air. For once, it looked like Danny would have the edge. The heated red glow from the fire in the room was going away, and the room went back to looking dark and grim, just like before.

"No…" Horrick hissed as he watched his power being diminished right in front of his eyes.

"Oh, YES!" Danny yelled, not looking at Horrick as he continued to put out all the extra fire in the room. "You're finished, Horrick!"

Horrick was struggling to keep his power going. He tried throwing some fire out of his hands the hit Danny on the side of the head and hurt him really badly, possibly kill him from the impact. But the fire now was much smaller and less hot. It was still nothing to scoff at, but it was a pale imitation to the fire he could control before.

Danny ducked out of the way as the fireball came shooting by his head. It created a small hole in the wall and an equally small fire as it hit, but Danny just put it out, too.

Horrick now thought things were getting hopeless. Danny was cutting off all the power in the room, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Soon, every fire in the room was out, rendering Horrick completely helpless. Danny breathed a deep sigh of relief as he saw Horrick had no more sources for power.

"All right, it's over," Danny said. He looked at Horrick for the first time since he started putting out all the fires. He pointed his water cannons right at Horrick's face, ready to strike the finishing blow.

Horrick was stuttering and breathing heavily. For the first time, he looked very scared of Danny and what he was about to do.

"Don't worry, I'm not going to kill you," Danny said. "I'm not going to stoop to that level." He loaded his water cannons. "But that doesn't mean I'm not going to try to pump any information out of you."

"What are you saying?"

"You said you were just trying to trap me in this oven by telling me my powers were in here," Danny recalled. He made it obvious he was about to fire his water cannons at Horrick's face. "Now don't lie to me this time, or you're getting a fistful of water. Where are my powers!"

"Okay, okay," Horrick stuttered. "Your powers are hidden deep in the woods behind my house."

"You swear?" Danny asked, trying to make Horrick as nervous as possible so he'd crack and tell the truth.

"Yes! That's where your powers are!"

A small smile cracked across Danny's face. "Thanks," he said. He turned around and started running out of the house. He ran around the back of the giant home and into the thick patches of trees behind the mansion.

Horrick watched in disbelief and defeat as he saw Danny run into the forest completely unhindered.

But then, Danny noticed something very unsettling. He looked at his fire-resistant suit, and it definitely appeared to be wearing down. The metal that made it up was now looking like it was melted and then thrown together. In other words, it was beginning to liquefy.

"Well, so much for that," Danny said. Not only that, but he also noticed he barely had any water left in the cannons after the fight. "Geez, dad didn't design this too well."

Thinking that having to run around with the suit on would be more of a hindrance than a help, Danny cast the suit off. Now he was back to just his casual, everyday clothes. Luckily, with Horrick no longer a threat, all Danny would have to do would be to go into the forest and find his power.

Horrick still couldn't believe that he had lost to Danny. The thought was simply unbearable. Who would have thought a fourteen-year old would have the common sense to douse every single fire in the room and stop the source of Horrick's power.

Then it hit Horrick like a sack of cement: every single fire _in the room_! In the struggle that had ensued, Horrick had forgotten that the rest of his house was still on fire.

Now laughing with glee and thinking that he had won, Horrick ran into a back room where the fire was spreading. He stepped right in the middle of a giant flame and let out a giant cackle as the blaze of orange and yellow swept over him. Gradually, he turned darker and darker, and fire started sprouting from him.

"Yes!...YES!" Horrick yelled. He stepped out of the fire about thirty seconds later, now just as strong as he was before.

Horrick immediately ran outside and started floating high above the trees. He could tell Danny was now deep in the woods now and would probably get lost trying to find his way out.

"Excellent," Horrick hissed. He started throwing massive amounts of fire down at the trees, setting them ablaze. Horrick started laughing as he saw the giant fires spread from tree to tree.

In just a matter of seconds, the fire would have spread to several trees, trapping Danny inside without his powers. It was only a matter of time now before Danny got cornered by the forest fire Horrick had created in a short time and either suffocated from the smoke or was killed by the fire.

"Danny has gotten on my nerves one too many times," Horrick said, looking at his work, the giant fire in the trees. "But with him inside that forest with the trees on fire, he has no hope of surviving."


	22. The Chase Through the Flaming Forest

In my last review, I got a question from GoingGhost about how Danny's powers could be just "lying around". Let me try to clear it up. Do you remember when Danny fought Compton a few chapters back? The fight ended with Compton falling off a building, and when Danny checked to make sure he was okay, Compton pressed a button on his battle suit that launched a claw out of his armor to reach INSIDE Danny and pull out his powers in physical form. Horrick just put Danny's powers in their physical form deep in the woods so Danny would have a hard time getting them.

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Now having a sense of confidence, Danny was strolling through the woods as if he had just won the world. It was very unfortunate for him to not realize that as he was walking in, Horrick had regained power by standing in loose fire and igniting all the trees around him.

After walking quickly through the woods for a second as the trees burned behind him, Danny began getting perplexed and frustrated by the complex maze of plants and wood around him that made it difficult to locate his powers.

"Man, why does Horrick have to make my life so hard?" Danny whined as he looked through. After quickly walking through the woods for several minutes, he was getting tired and was breathing a little heavier.

Danny continued walking until he stopped. He went over to a tree and sat down under it. He took a deep breath and a moment to catch his breath.

"So, where would Horrick put my powers?" Danny started thinking out loud. Normally, he'd feel stupid talking to himself, but he felt pretty optimistic about the way his fight with Horrick just went, so he didn't think he had much to worry about.

"Maybe he put them in some thick bushes that would be impossible to get to," he thought. "Or maybe he buried them in the ground. Or…maybe they're in a tree?" Danny just stared off for a second before he started thinking to himself again "Gah! At this rate, I'll _never_ find my powers!"

Danny just sighed and looked at the ground. Then, his nose perked up about something it sensed. He looked up with a curious expression and looked around. He continued to sniff around him, thinking he was smelling something. He then made a quick, grossed out sound and pinched his nostrils closed.

"Ugh! That's gross!" Danny yelled. "That smells just like the boys' bathroom in school when those loser kids smoke!"

Danny just sat there until he realized what he just said. But when he came to his senses, he jumped up like a cat when someone steps on its tail. "Wait…smoke!"

Danny jumped up from the tree he was sitting under. His heart began racing as he ran back in the way he came, since that was where the smell was coming from.

It was noticeably getting hotter as Danny walked back. He shuffled his way through trees and bushes until he saw something to his complete horror. The trees he ran by just a minute or so before were now engulfed in flames. The fire jumped from tree to tree very quickly. If Danny just stood there, the fire would gobble him up in a matter of seconds.

Now fearing for his life and realizing that he was now in the middle of a forest that was going up in flames, Danny turned backwards and started running as fast and as hard as he could.

The fire stayed in close pursuit of him as he ran from it. Small clumps of fire were bursting up from the ground just a few feet away from him as he ran, like geysers when they burst. (Except this time, they spat out fire)

Danny continued running as the fire from behind spread to other trees and got closer and closer to him. If Danny stopped or slowed down for more than twenty seconds, the fire would catch up and roast him alive.

The fire made loud, threatening cackling noises as Danny felt it come closer and closer to him as he ran from it. The only sound he heard other than those horrible noises was his heavy breathing as his lungs began to get tired out.

Things were never looking worse for Danny than they were now. His lungs were getting weak from both the smoke inhalation and from running for so hard for such a long period of time. He had no idea how long he was running, nor did he know when it would end.

"_Why am I running?"_ Danny had to ask himself. _"The fire is eventually going to catch up with me, and I'll be as good as dead then! Why don't I just end it now and not make myself suffer anymore?"_

Danny seriously considered this option for a long time before something lit up in his head. "No! I can't give up!"

Now feeling like all of his energy and stamina came strictly from his will to live. This entire situation reminded Danny of the end of _Return of the Jedi_, where the Millennium Falcon was racing away from the explosion and trying to make its way out of the death star. The difference, of course, being that he was running from fire on foot, and he was in a forest.

Having to think fast several times, Danny had to either push his way through thick bushes or thorns, creating painful yet bearable scratches on his arms and legs. He also had to make very quick jumps across stumps sticking up from the grounds. Danny had remembered seeing this forest countless times when he went to Horrick's mansion, but never in his wildest nightmares did he imagine himself being chased through it by a giant fire.

Danny was clearly weakening; his strides were much shorter, his breath was becoming heavier and more labored, his mouth was dangling open and his black hair was becoming very messy. He was sweating up a storm as body perspiration appeared on his red face, whether it was turning red from exhaustion or from the intense heat of the fire.

The fire just seemed to become more and more raging as Danny fought his way away from it and tried his best to keep himself alive as long as possible.

After running for what seemed like an extremely long time, Danny finally found somewhere that didn't look like the fire was going to reach any time soon. It was in a thick patch of trees that seemed far away from the chasing flames. Danny ran there as fast as he could and hid under them. Just as he predicted, the fire seemed to steer away from him under there.

Danny took a moment to catch his breath and to try to regain his strength, but it was hard not to breathe in without getting a mouthful of smoke. He felt as if he was about to collapse, either from smoke poisoning or exhaustion. He sat down under the patches of trees and curled up into a tight ball.

It was then that Danny tried taking in everything that had happened over the past couple days that had led up to this horrid run for his life. He blamed Horrick. It was entirely Horrick's fault.

If Horrick hadn't shown up to battle Danny on that night, then Danny never would have transformed and his parents wouldn't have caught him. If his parents didn't catch him, then Jack wouldn't have tried to deactivate the Fenton Portal.

If Jack hadn't tried to deactivate the Fenton Portal, then that spark connecting Danny and Horrick never would have happened. If that didn't happen, Aria wouldn't have come up, and if Aria didn't come up, then Compton wouldn't have seen Danny go ghost when he was staring out his window.

If Compton hadn't seen Danny transform, then Horrick wouldn't have convinced Compton to join forces with him. Danny would never have gone over Compton's house, so he therefore wouldn't have gotten captured and taken to Horrick's mansion.

If Danny hadn't been taken to Horrick's mansion, then he wouldn't have fought Aria and she wouldn't have died. If she didn't die, Horrick wouldn't be after him. If Horrick wasn't after him, Danny wouldn't have had to run away. If he didn't run away, then he wouldn't have gotten captured by Horrick and Compton.

If those two didn't bring him back to Horrick's mansion, then Danny and Horrick wouldn't have fought and Horrick wouldn't have turned into the fire monster that he had become. At the same time, Compton wouldn't have ended up telling everyone at Danny's school Danny's secret for not surrendering his powers. If that didn't happen, then Danny and Compton wouldn't have fought, and Compton wouldn't have died, nor would he end up stealing Danny's powers for Horrick.

If Horrick hadn't gotten Danny's powers, then obviously he would not have had to fight Horrick, therefore he wouldn't be trapped in this forest that was going up in flames around him.

All these "wouldn't haves" seemed to create a spiral that not even Danny himself could believe. The thought of that entire sequence of events seemed unreal to him. If just one little thing had been changed in that entire sequence, then he wouldn't be fearing for his life. He just couldn't believe that all of those events had come down to this chase.

"Oh man," Danny said as he realized something awful after those thoughts just whooshed through his head. The fire was now coming closer towards him, and soon it would trap him again.

Now back on his feet, Danny was once again fleeing for the privilege to continue living. But after sitting down, his body had gotten considerably slower and he couldn't feel like he could run much longer.

Danny continued his struggle to escape the fire, but his legs now felt heavier than concrete, not to mention they felt pretty wobbly. He was going so slow that he considered that he seriously might have been able to go faster if he walked.

Then, the unimaginable happened. When running, Danny lost his footing and slipped. He plummeted to the ground, but still had enough energy to reflexively put his hands down to cushion the impact. He was now sprawled flat on the ground, though, and when he looked up, he saw there was a giant wall of fire in front of him, preventing him from moving forward any further.

Danny gasped at that sight, and then pushed himself up. He tried running backwards, looking for a way out, but there was more fire there, too. Fire was blocking him in at every single direction. He was stuck in a giant box of fire, and it was slowly closing in on him. He would be dead in a matter of seconds when the giant flames came into contact with him.

A small whine came from Danny's mouth. This was more of a whine of fear, the same kind a little puppy makes when it gets scared of a toy that moves on its own. It was all over for him now.

Danny slowly crouched down on the ground and waited for the four walls of fire to completely encase him, and ultimately kill him. Although his face looked it, he wasn't about to break down or to completely die like he was being executed; he was trying to take this inevitability the best he could.

Then, when Danny was slouching onto the ground, he felt something press up against his leg. It felt like there was something in his pants that pushed itself against him as he curled up. There was obviously something in his pocket.

"Hello?" Danny asked, reaching in and pulling out a small gray box that had a small latch on the top of it. "What's this?"

At first, Danny had no idea what it was that he was holding, but then the memory came to him. "Oh yeah! This is dad's 'final' invention!" Danny yelled. "But, what does it do?"

Danny thought long and hard about what it was his dad's invention did, but his thoughts were quickly distracted by the closing-in fire. Then, Jack's words explaining the tool popped into his head.

"_When opened, it releases a super-thick cloud of vapor that contains toxic chemicals. This time, I made sure those chemicals were only toxic to pure ghosts, so they wouldn't hurt you if you breathed them in." _Danny remembered his dad saying that when he first got the invention.

Immediately following that, more words popped into Danny's head. He remembered what Lancer said in chemistry class the very next day when they were doing that experiment about trying to count how many calories were in a single peanut. Lancer was drilling them on safety features in the class about how there would be an open flame in the classroom during the experiment and where the fire extinguisher was. He then remembered Lancer stressed the reasons _why_ a fire extinguisher put out fire.

"_Yes, the gases and steam suffocates the fire so the fire can't get any oxygen, and without any oxygen, the fire will die."_ Danny recalled hearing Lancer say in that class. Then, two ideas just clicked in his mind.

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled. "I'm surrounded by fire…with a little box that lets out a ton of steam…and that can put out the fire!"

It was Danny's last hope. He opened up the small latch on the gray box, and enough steam to fill a water tower came pouring out of it. True to his dad's words, Danny didn't lose any breath from it, since the steam was supposed to only be poisonous to pure ghosts.

However, the steam _did_ create a huge amount of fog, and it clouded Danny's vision. He couldn't tell whether or not the steam was actually putting the fire out.

It was several seconds before the steam started clearing, but Danny could tell things were getting better. It was a pretty obvious sign, now that the intense heat seemed to be dying down around him.

Danny still couldn't see very well, but he saw that a lot of the black smoke was now turning brighter. He looked around after the steam finally cleared, and around him stood a giant charred box where the fire had been. He was disturbed by how close the black box was around him, considering the fact that was how close the fire had been.

Danny couldn't believe it. His dad's last invention actually proved useful in a time of need, and at a much unexpected time, at that. That invention ended up saving Danny's life.

The greatest surprise for Danny, though, was what he saw after the smoke and remaining steam had cleared and allowed him to see straight again.


	23. Final Battle

Danny couldn't believe it. It seemed so unreal. He had chained together all the events that had put him in that flaming forest where he almost lost his life, and in a bizarre twist of events, it was his dad's last invention that ended up saving him from the ring of fire closing in on him.

It was ironic that his dad made ghost hunting equipment when he was really hunting down his own son, but even more ironic that it was the equipment that was made to hunt ghosts that ended up saving Danny. His life since he first met Horrick when the Comptons moved in had gotten very complicated, and he hoped it would end soon.

And it looked like it was going to, because after Jack's "last invention" saved Danny from the fire, a clear pathway ahead into the forest was seen. And right at the end of the pathway was a giant, transparent tube that had a black jumpsuit floating in it, surrounded by black, ghostly energy. There was no mistaking it; those were his powers, all right.

Danny broke a huge smile of joy and relief when he saw his powers in that tube. Despite the immense physical stress his body had overcome, Danny quickly made his way over to the tube and found a small door on it. He pounded the door with the side of his fist, and the door gave in.

Once the door was down, Danny reached inside the cylinder-shaped tube and tried to grab at his powers. But as soon as he did, the black jumpsuit turned completely white and started to float. It went right in front of Danny, and then forced itself inside of him. As the white matter poured through him, Danny felt his entire body regain its strength. His legs, which were feeling heavy yet light at the same time, were now feeling strong and stable. His lungs didn't feel pain every single time he tried to breathe in now, and he was able to concentrate on everything around him now.

His eyes squeezed shut, and when he opened them, they were a shade of green.

"Yes!" Danny hissed with excitement. He was happy that he had his powers back now and was guaranteed to get out of the forest alive. "Now all I got to do is fly out of here, and…"

"You're not going anywhere!" said a deep voice.

Danny gasped and stopped himself in mid speech. He hoped he could just fly upwards, past the trees and escape, but he wanted to know who just stopped him right there.

Danny looked around and tried to find where that voice was coming from. He looked forwards, to the side and behind him, but he couldn't see anyone or anything. His question was answered when he heard some rustling.

Danny looked upwards, and in a smoldering tree, a black figure jumped out. The figure looked like he was taller than Danny and he was black as charcoal with a huge amount of red smoke coming from him. Just touching him could give someone a burn that would scar them for the rest of their life.

"Admirable. Truly admirable," said the black figure. "I can't believe it. I fight you three times, and no matter how close I came to winning, you always came out on top!"

"Horrick…" Danny said. He clenched his hands at his side and transformed into his ghost half. He was exhausted, and still being in the hot forest as the other parts of it were still on fire and made the entire area scorching.

"Yes," Horrick said. "I kidnap your friends and family, and just as I was about to win, you beat me in that fight. You set me on fire, inadvertently giving me all these amazing powers over fire! Then I try to roast you when you go into your school's bathroom, and…"

"Wait a minute!" Danny yelled. "You mean when I was going into the bathroom in school the other day, and that giant burst of fire came out of it…that was you, trying to kill me?"

"Yes!" Horrick yelled. "And once again you managed to survive. Then I have Compton take his ghost hunting suit and try to destroy you with it. His suit was better than anything your parents could have concocted, and yet you still defeated him anyway!"

Danny wasn't sure whether or not Horrick was complementing him, but he continued to grind his teeth and keep his fists clenched at his side. Fighting Horrick was the last thing that he wanted. He was still very exhausted after just barely making it through the blazing woods.

"And _then_ I come and take your powers, so you're completely helpless!" Horrick continued. "But you come back in your new battle suit and run into my house, looking for your powers. You inexplicably figure out me having no fire will cause me to lose my strength, and you beat me yet again."

"Is there a point to this?" Danny asked.

"Even after I've set my house on fire, you escape and run into these woods looking for your powers, but now you don't even have your suit to protect you. I set this entire forest on fire, and yet you _still_ find a way to survive. And now you've found your powers. That is truly admirable."

"Thanks," Danny said in a way that made it obvious he didn't care and that he could tell Horrick was being insincere. "The only thing that'll make it more proud is if I fight you now and beat you!"

Horrick started smiling. "I knew you wouldn't last long without saying that. You want a fight to the death? Fine."

Horrick put out his hand, and a sword completely made of fire appeared in it. "If you want to defeat me so badly, then do it!"

Now Danny was sure this was all it had come down to. Everything that he had been through had come down to this very fight.

Horrick started by leaping in the air with more energy than Danny thought he had and he took a vicious swing at Danny with his fiery sword. Danny ducked out of the way just in time and jumped into the air and started floating.

"Too slow!" Danny taunted.

Horrick replied to this by jumping in the air and floating right beside him. He took savage swings at Danny while they both floated, and it took Danny's sharpest reflexes to dodge Horrick's sword every single time.

"Hey, are you going to actually try to hit me, or are you just trying to get your aerobics in?" Danny asked, trying his best to get on Horrick's nerves.

Horrick grunted, and then took a vertical swing, trying to slice Danny at the side of the neck. Danny ducked out of the way and the sword cut off the branch in a tree like it was a laser going through butter.

The branch fell off and plummeted to the ground. Danny stopped floating and dropped to the ground and picked up the long branch. He looked up and saw Horrick charging at him, with his sword ready to strike.

After quickly dodging it, Danny lifted up the giant branch and started making forceful pokes towards Horrick with it. Horrick just took a swipe at the branch and cut off the end of it, though.

Danny's weapon was now drastically shorter, but at least he could still fight with it. Now that the branch he was holding was lighter, he could swing it much faster. But just as he tried stabbing it at Horrick again, Horrick made another slash with his sword. This time, the cut wasn't completely straight, so part of the end was pointed.

But after being cut off twice, the branch now felt relatively light and Danny thought he might be able to throw it now as a spear or something with its more pointed end.

Just as Horrick was ready to make another slash, Danny threw the branch like a spear and it hit Horrick in the arm, and planted itself there.

Horrick let out a scream of pain and dropped his sword on the ground. Danny quickly took this opportunity to make a run for it and to grab it.

But just as his hand came into contact with the sword, he withdrew his hand and let out a loud scream of pain. He looked at his hand, and it now looked relatively black. In fact, Danny could swear he even saw some smoke coming out of it.

Horrick started snickering. "Did you not notice that sword was _completely_ made of fire!" he yelled. "Go ahead, try to pick it up again!"

Instead, Danny jumped in the air again and flew over to Horrick as fast as he could. He delivered a quick kick to Horrick's stomach, but it didn't seem to hurt Horrick too much.

"Come on, Danny," Horrick taunted. "I thought you had more in you than that."

"I do!" Danny insisted. "How about some of this!"

Danny held out his hand and fired a blast of energy at Horrick, but Horrick countered by throwing a ball of fire. The two forms of energy collided, and created a small explosion in mid air.

"It's over, Danny," Horrick said. "Your simple ghost powers are no match for fire powers!"

"You're wrong!" Danny screamed. He flew over to a tree, and Horrick threw some fire at him. Danny ducked, mumbling the words, "Good. I was hoping you'd do that."

The fire severed a branch from the tree, and the branch fell to the ground. Danny flew down to pick it up and started using it as a weapon once again.

Now, it was a standoff scene between the two. Both of them stared at each other without saying a word, until Horrick finally made the first attack. He threw up both of his hands, and two pillars of fire. Danny had to quickly jump out of the way of both of them so he wouldn't get roasted.

"All right, nice try!" Danny said. "My turn!"

Danny took a violent swing at Horrick's head with the heavy piece of wood. The blow hit, and Horrick was knocked onto the ground, clutching the side of his head in pain.

As Horrick moaned, Danny floated down and still clutched the branch in his hand. "It's over, Horrick. You've lost. Time to give in."

Horrick groaned and looked up at Danny. He was still clutching the side of his head, and it looked like it was even dented a little. Maybe Danny had hit Horrick there a little too hard.

"N…never!" Horrick hissed. "I will avenge my daughter…I will avenge Aria!"

After he finished this thought, Horrick jumped up and started fighting even more savagely than he did before. Without using any of his powers, he started violently throwing punches and slamming his fists into Danny in any spots that would register pain.

Danny didn't see this and therefore wasn't able to react to it or defend himself. He got several blows to the face, causing a flow of blood from his nose and losing a lot of breath as he could hits to the stomach.

Finally, Horrick gave Danny one last punch in the stomach and threw him on to the ground. Danny was slugging around on the ground, dropping his weapon. His eyes were squeezed shut, and when he finally opened them, he saw Horrick giving him possibly the coldest stare he had ever gotten.

"You have caused me so much pain and suffering over these past few days, Danny," Horrick said.

"You shouldn't be the one talking," Danny managed to get out.

"Well, you won't be talking anymore in a moment," Horrick said.

The entire forest around them went deadly quiet. The only sound that could be heard was the sound of fire sizzling in trees that were too far away to see, and the faint amount of smoke made it look foggier.

"I still am," Danny moaned. Finally, he clenched up his fist. "…and I don't plan on stopping any time soon!"

Danny rolled out of the way, just as Horrick was ready to deal a finishing blow. He got up off the ground and ran over to the branch that he had been using for defense. He started taking swings at Horrick's head again with it, but in his weakened state, he wasn't able to swing it that fast.

Horrick fired one more fireball at Danny's branch, and it got reduced to a pile of ash. Danny was now unarmed, and Horrick looked like he was ready to fire again. Except this one looked like it was going to be completely disastrous. Horrick charged up a giant fireball that was almost bigger than he was.

Danny's eyes widened at this site, and just as Horrick fired it, he jumped out of the way. It looked exactly the way dodges look in action movies: a jump that seemed to go in slow motion that just barely missed getting caught in a fiery explosion.

The giant fireball completely annihilated the tree behind Danny. The tree started to give in, and it's trunk was now so small it looked like a little kid could snap it in half. The giant tree it was supporting fell down. The burned stump might as well have been trying to support the tree as a piece of hay.

As the tree started collapsing, it leaned in Horrick's direction. Danny had jumped out of the way and was recovering from the quick jump. As he got up, he saw the massive tree falling right towards Horrick.

Horrick let out a loud scream, but it wasn't clear whether it was from fear, shock, or anger. The giant tree fell on top of him and smashed him like a bug.

Danny gasped breathlessly as the giant tree remained on top of Horrick. He didn't say anything, but rather just sat there and stared at the sight of the tree falling on top of his enemy.

The silence was at last broken when Danny got up. He ran over to the tree and looked at it for the longest time, mixed emotions flowing through his mind. "Horrick?...Horrick!"


	24. Saying Goodbye

In one of my last reviews, I got asked the question on why Horrick didn't just set the tree on fire or anything that could have saved him. It's not going to be explained in the story, so let me try to explain now. Ever see a movie where something big is about to crush somebody, but instead of running away, the camera just shows them screaming as the giant object is about to crush them? (or something similar to that) It's the same basic thing. Horrick was just in shock and didn't know what to do, and he simply took too long to get out of the way.

Anyway, thank you guys so much for those reviews last chapter. I don't usually get four reviews for the same story for a few chapters in a row, so thank you very much for that. Please keep reviewing, because reviews mean a lot to me!

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Danny stared at the tree that had collapsed on Horrick. He screamed Horrick's name a few times, but he didn't get any response. After not being able to take the painful silence any longer, (aside from the sound of fire burning in the trees off in the distance) Danny ran over to the giant tree that was on top of Horrick.

Danny put his hands against the tree and tried his best to push the tree off of him, but it was no use. The tree was too heavy; it barely budged.

Without even saying anything, Danny put out his hands and started firing some of his ectoplasmic energy at the tree. He cut two lines straight down the vertical middle of it, with Horrick in between those two lines. That way, Danny could easily just push away the part that was on top of his enemy.

After doing so, Danny pushed the stub of the tree he had cut off of Horrick and rolled it to the side.

There was a gruesome sight left for Danny after the log was pushed off of Horrick, because Horrick was now smashed. He looked very flat, like a bug after you squash it.

Horrick was lying on his stomach, so Danny turned him over to see what his front side looked like. His face looked very badly smashed in, and some of his teeth were knocked out or out of place.

Danny tried not to show any signs of disturbance looking at Horrick's crushed figure, but it was hard. After all, it wasn't everyday you saw someone right after a giant tree fell on top of them.

Danny slowly bent downwards and tried to pick up Horrick's remains, until Danny got the shock of his life. As he lifted up Horrick's corpse, Horrick's eyes twitched and focused on him. Danny's heart skipped a beat.

"What…do you…think…you're doing?" Horrick managed to croak out. His face had no emotions on it, and his voice sounded drier than someone after being stuck out in the desert for weeks.

Danny gasped and he didn't have any words to say for a while. He just stared open-mouthed in disbelief at the fact Horrick was still alive. Even though Horrick could clearly no longer fight, Danny was still afraid of him for some reason.

Finally, Danny got some of his determination back and looked Horrick in the eye. "I'm doing what I should have done a long time ago!" Danny snapped.

After he said this, Danny seemed to inexplicably get stronger. He lifted Horrick up onto his shoulders and started flying out of the burning forest. After he was a safe distance away from it, he turned around and saw nothing but a burnt structure for Horrick's mansion and once green trees that were now smoldering, were on fire, or were completely gone.

"My…home…" Horrick hissed when he saw what he had done to it.

"Yeah, it could have still been yours if you had just minded your own business!" Danny scolded. He turned around and started flying away from Horrick's house. That would be the last time Horrick would ever see it.

Danny flied through the entire Ghost Zone back to the portal to his house. He passed though the swirling green gate and found himself back in his basement, victorious.

"Whew," Danny said, exhaling. "It's over."

"It's…not…over," Horrick said.

Danny had almost forgotten Horrick was still slumped over his shoulder. In fact, Danny had forgotten entirely _why_ he brought Horrick back with him. But, after seeing Horrick's completely black body that looked nothing more than a human mold of charcoal, Danny remembered what he was doing.

"No, trust me on this one," Danny replied. "It. Is. OVER!"

Danny instantly went intangible and flew both him and Horrick out of their house and outside. Danny became visible again and started flying high above the streets, looking obsessively for something.

Then, Danny found it. After a short, but loud, "Aha!", Danny started descending down into a small area between two patches of trees. The sound of running water could be heard as he planted his feet on the ground.

"Why…have you tak…en…me here?" Horrick managed to break out and somehow finding the strength to talk.

"Horrick, you're not doing yourself any favors by holding on like this," Danny said, looking his nemesis in the eyes. "You're only causing more suffering for yourself."

"I…will…not…die," Horrick croaked.

"Oh, really?" Danny asked. He then looked ahead of him, and non-verbally gestured for Horrick to do the same. Horrick painstakingly turned his head and gasped on his breath at what he saw.

In front of them was the stream that Danny had spent the night when he ran away from home on the day Aria died. The running water looked peaceful, but knowing what he was about to do, Danny thought the water actually looked rather treacherous.

Horrick's eyes widened. He, too, saw what Danny was planning on doing. Slowly, Danny walked over to the water and took a few steps into it, just enough for his feet to be submerged.

"Horrick, you've been a real pain these past few weeks, you know?" Danny asked. "I tried to reason with you, but you wouldn't listen. And now…well, this is what you're getting because of it."

"Ha!" Horrick yelled. "This…can't be what…you consid…er…vengeance?"

"Trust me," Danny said, giving Horrick a gentle and almost caring look, "I'm doing this for your own good, not mine."

Horrick didn't know what to say. He wanted to try to wiggle his way out of Danny's arms, but he was too weak.

"Horrick, you're nothing except one giant pile of walking ash now," Danny said. "And your home is now burned down. Where the heck do you think you're going to live now?"

Horrick didn't say anything. Instead, he only grumbled at what Danny was saying. He simply didn't have any way to respond to the comments Danny was making.

"Fine…" Horrick choked. "If…you…dare…"

"For the last time!" Danny yelled, "I don't want to do this either, but guess what? I'm doing it so you won't suffer any longer!"

Horrick still wouldn't admit defeat. He looked at Danny with those cold eyes that Danny had grown resistant to. "Aria…my daughter…I will…avenge…her…"

Danny could no longer take it. At that moment, he let go of everything Horrick said and all his emotions. In one swift motion, Danny pulled his arms out from under Horrick, so now nothing was supporting Horrick. Gravity did the work as Horrick fell and landed with a hard splash in the water.

The birds stopped singing and the wind seemed to freeze at that moment. Danny watched with unbelieving eyes as he saw Horrick in the water. Horrick slowly began to break apart. Danny was right: Horrick _was_ nothing more than a pile of ash now, and putting him in the water caused his body to break down like ash.

In just seconds, the ash that made up Horrick's body had begun disintegrating. The small black particles began disappearing and vaporized in the water. After what seemed like forever, any remaining trace of Horrick was gone in the water.

Danny's heart was thumping, with a completely neutral face. He seriously did it so Horrick wouldn't have to suffer through life anymore, not only in physical pain, but inside pains knowing that he failed to avenge Aria. Danny really thought Horrick was doing himself no favors by clinging on to life by a thread.

After just staring at the river that proved to be Horrick's final resting place, Danny transformed back into his human self. He was exhausted after that decisive fight, but he insisted on walking home anyway.

"It's kind of funny," Danny thought to himself. "The place where I spent the night turned out to be the spot where Horrick's remains would spend the rest of eternity. Wow, it's kind of disturbing, actually…"

Danny turned around and walked away from the stream and back to the main road. He made that walk to his house, and he looked in through a window when he finally made it.

Inside, both of his parents were sitting on the couch and wringing their hands together, looking more nervous by the second. It was a scary thought for them to know that their son was out there, alone, fighting a ghost with power to control fire.

Danny walked over to the front of his house and pushed open the door with a large smile on his face. "Mom! Dad!" he cried.

"Danny!" they both yelled. Jack and Maddie jumped up from the sofa and ran over to Danny, giving him one of the biggest hugs he had ever gotten.

The hug lasted for quite a while until Danny's parents finally let him go. All three of them looked like they were very happy.

"So my ghost suit actually helped you win the fight!" Jack asked excitedly.

"Uh…yeah, I guess you could say that," Danny casually replied.

Danny proceeded to tell his parents all about the fight that he had just been involved in. Everything, from fighting Horrick inside his burning mansion to running through the flaring jungle to the decisive moment when Horrick accidentally caused the tree to fall on top of himself. But for some reason, Danny had a hard time telling his parents about Horrick's ultimate fate.

"So, he's sitting at the bottom of the river now?" Jack asked, making sure he understood everything.

"Yup," Danny clarified. "In very small pieces."

"Well son, I don't know how else to say it," Jack started, "but you've made us proud."

"Thanks, guys," Danny warmly said. "But I there's just one thing I want you to do, dad."

"Right now, Danny, I'll do anything for you."

Danny kept the smile on his face as he looked at his dad for a moment or two. "Dad…can you please go back to making ghost hunting equipment? I think it'll come in very handy for me, especially after how your Fenton-Gasser thingamabob saved my life."

Jack didn't say anything for a while. After looking like he took a surprising amount of thought to decide, he finally said, "Of course I will."

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No, it's not the end in case you guys were wondering. There will be another chapter after this one, which will be posted on the same day as the first chapter of my _Tales of Symphonia _fanfic, Tales of Tiberia. (just in case any of you besides Leppers have any interest interest in read it)


	25. Leaving for Good

It was days after Danny had defeated Horrick. He was finally able to focus on school and the things that really mattered to him again. However, he knew things would never be the same, now that his secret was known to his parents.

Danny's grades slowly got higher and higher, and he was actually able to enjoy himself a lot more now. Never before had he come closer to death than he had been running through the forest that Horrick set on fire, hoping to toast him alive in. Danny was now _especially_ thankful for his dad's inventions, because one of them actually saved Danny's life.

A few days later, Danny was in school and eating lunch with his best friends as if nothing had ever happened. He was ready to put the entire thing behind him, but thanks to Mr. Compton, he wouldn't be able to do that anytime soon.

Danny was just about to put some food into his mouth until a random student came up from behind Danny and started talking to him.

"Hey Danny, is it true that you really have these awesome ghost powers that your parents gave you when they performed an experiment on you!"

"_Is that what everyone thinks happened?"_ Danny asked himself. _"Wow, how much did Compton stretch the truth when he told everybody?"_

Danny started to respond to the student who asked him the question, but a voice suddenly cut him off. "No, he doesn't. Now leave him alone!"

Danny and the student looked to the side and saw Jazz standing there with an irritated expression and her hands on her hips.

"_Oh no. Jazz, go away. Please?"_

"Leave my little brother alone!" Jazz demanded poking the student hard in the chest as she walked over to him.

"Whoa, chill out," the student said. "I just wanted to know if he was really a ghost from another dimension!"

"Well, he isn't!" Jazz yelled. "So leave him alone!"

"Okay, okay," the student said, walking away.

"Uh…thanks," Danny said, trying to show he appreciated Jazz trying her best to help him out. But he really wanted to just take things on his own now, and thought he was more than capable of handling it on his own.

The walk home from school that day seemed to be a particularly average one. The wind blew Danny's hair back as he walked against it and a few leaves blew across the ground. He listened to the birds singing without a care in the world and was glad that his life was going to be simple again.

Then, Danny saw something when he was walking towards his house. There appeared to be several massive trucks sitting outside the Comptons' house. Could they be…moving trucks?

"What's going on?" Danny asked himself as he walked into his house, not once taking his eyes off of the trucks that were sitting in the driveway.

Danny walked into the house and was greeted by his two parents. Almost as if they were reading his thoughts, Maddie spoke up and said, "Danny, did you see those trucks outside Mrs. Compton's driveway?"

"Yeah, I did," Danny agreed. "Do you know what that's about?"

"Actually, no," Maddie said. "Your father and I were talking about it for a while, but the only reason we could come up with was because she was movi…"

Danny's mom got cut off in the middle of her sentence by a knock on the door. All of them stopped talking and passed glances at each other, asking with their facial expressions, "Who's going to get that?"

Without even saying anything, Danny just walked away and answered the door himself. He got an unpleasant surprise when he saw that it was Mrs. Compton standing there. She looked like she was mixed between anger and depression.

"Mrs. Compton?" Danny asked.

"What do you want?" Jack demanded, defensively.

Mrs. Compton looked liked she was about to burst into tears. "I'm…being forced to drop the lawsuit."

"What?" all three Fentons asked at once.

"The court says that my husband's death has been ruled accidental suicide, so his injuries are no longer worth anything…" Mrs. Compton choked.

A huge smile started spreading across Danny's face. For some reason, the entire thought just felt unreal to him. He knew he was responsible for the lawsuit after he gave Mr. Compton that head injury with the ectoplasmic blast, but he didn't actually think that winning the fight against Compton would cause the suit to be lifted.

Now that Compton was dead, he didn't have any more medical expenses to pay, and Danny's family would no longer be responsible.

"Well, sorry to hear about your husband," Danny said in a sarcastic and cocky way, giving Mrs. Compton a snobby look that enraged her.

"Hey, what's with all those giant trucks outside your house?" Jack brought up as Mrs. Compton gave Danny a cold look.

"I can't even stand to look at you people anymore!" Mrs. Compton shrieked. "That demon boy of yours hurt my husband because _you_ people were irresponsible and reckless with your ghost hunting equipment! All I wanted was justice and for you to pay for my husband's injuries, but now I can't even have that!"

"Take a chill pill lady," Danny said, not caring what he said to Mrs. Compton now. In fact, he thought it was pretty funny how she was freaking out.

"You be quiet, you little brat!" Mrs. Compton snapped, bending over and pointing her finder right in front of Danny's nose.

"Nah," Danny said, trying his best to get on her nerves.

"Hey! Don't you 'nah' me! Do you understand!"

"Yeah, sure."

"You'd better!" Mrs. Compton yelled. Her face was turning red and it was obvious she was filling up with fury.

"Will you please just answer Jack's question?" Maddie requested. "What are all those trucks doing outside your house?"

"I'm moving away!" she shrieked. "Far away! I can't even stand to look at you people anymore."

Saying this, Mrs. Compton stormed away and headed back to her house.

"See you later, bag lady!" Danny screamed after her, trying to get one more insult in. Mrs. Compton shot around, gave Danny a cold glare, and then proceeded to walk back towards her house.

As Mrs. Compton walked away, Danny continued giving her that cocky, in-your-face look. Finally, when she was back inside her house, Danny turned to his parents.

"So, I guess my college fund isn't going to be blown on a lawyer after all?" he asked hopefully.

"Nope," Jack promised. "No, we won't."

"That's good," Danny said.

So in the end, Danny ended up defeating two ghosts, battling and winning against his surprisingly violent neighbor, barely made it through a flaming forest with his life and managed to rescue his family and friends from almost certain death. And all of it happened in such a short amount of time, Danny couldn't believe it.

Danny and his parents were just standing there, all wearing smiles. Then, something unexpected happened that completely ruined the moment.

Danny gasped and a thin stream of blue smoke came out of his mouth. Jack and Maddie were evidently surprised by this.

"Danny, what was that?" Maddie asked breathlessly.

"Huh? Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you guys," Danny said, looking very laid-back. "That's my ghost sense. It alerts me when a ghost is nearby."

"What then?" Jack asked.

"Well, I just pretty much go and beat it up," Danny said.

"Are you sure you're going to be all right?" Maddie asked, concerned.

Danny scoffed. "Don't worry, I've had to take on hundreds of these guys before. As far as I'm concerned, they're just mandatory exercise programs."

"Well, okay…" Maddie said.

"Well then, wish me luck!" Danny said.

Danny transformed into his ghost half. After the two white rings turned him into his ghost alter ego, he stepped outside of his house but still stood right in front of the doorway. He gave his parents a two-finger salute, and then flew off to battle the ghost.

**THE END**

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Author's Note:

(exhales) That's it. That there is my last Danny Phantom fanfic until August or September probably. It's actually a little depressing, since for about six and a half months now, I've been writing Danny Phantom stories, starting with _Split Decisions _before Thanksgiving. Now I'm going to stop writing them for a while, and I might even miss writing them a little. Writing these fanfictions has become something I've done almost every day, and after doing the same thing every day for six and a half months, it's not going to be easy ending it all for a while.

I want to thank Leppers, Jenna Dax, GoingGhost and Whisper of (or now, Chrono's) Darkness. You guys have all been great when reviewing this. You guys probably know how much it means to me to have my work reviewed and to hear great things said about it. You guys are the best, thank you so much for reviewing.

You might be interested to know how I came up with the story for _Revelations and Revenge. _Well, I started thinking about an idea for my third Danny Phantom story a while into _Descendant's Curse_. I was expecting DC to get a lot of reviews, but I was pretty disappointed with it around the middle. It was then I started trying to come up with a story that people seemed to like a lot.

It was then that I noticed that the stories with the most reviews were ones where somebody found out about Danny's secret who shouldn't, so I figured I should give it a shot. But I also tried to mold a story out of it and not just have it be something like a plot event that would get people to read it.

So probably a week or two before the end of March, I had decided what I wanted the main focus to be in my story, but I still needed to outline it. Then, on April 1, I watched a movie where a character was running through a jungle that was on fire, and I liked the idea of having someone chased through a place going up in flames so much, I decided I wanted that to be how the story would end.

This is when I used the Work-Backwards method, which is the first time I've tried it. I knew what I wanted everything to lead up to, so instead of starting at the beginning and deciding what happened after each event, I instead decided to start at the end and decide how exactly Danny was going to wind up in the forest going up in flames. The rest just fell into place. Can you believe it? A 30 second chase scene in a movie ended up being the total basis for this story's plot.

After less than a week of outlining and planning this story out, the first chapter got posted here, and the rest is history.

I really am going to miss writing these stories, but I have a bigger one coming up over the summer. In fact, it's now up on the _Tales of Symphonia_ section. It's called Tales of Tiberia, which is what my entire summer is going to be revolving around. ToS is my favorite video game and I've been dying to write a fanfic for it since I first signed up to this site in September. After months and months of bouncing ideas off the wall and trying to outline the story, it's finally here, so I'm very excited about that.

Besides, I can safely assure you this won't be my last Danny Phantom fanfic. It will, however, probably be the last one until August at the earliest. But I already have ideas ready for it. I think it will be a great one, but we'll just have to wait for a few weeks, won't we?

Anyway, enough about that, I'm here to talk about Revelations and Revenge. I have had a lot of fun writing this story and making it one of the darker ones I've written in my whole life. I don't know if I'm going to miss outlining the stories more, or if I'm going to miss writing them more. But I think I know the thing I'm going to miss the most, and that's my reviewers.

You guys have been so great and have made me feel so good by saying that my stories are awesome. You guys have been the awesome ones for sticking by chapter after chapter and giving me feedback.

I'm going to miss you guys and writing these stories, but it's only a temporary good-bye. Tales of Tiberia will probably eat up the whole summer, but I'll still be trying to come up with ideas for my fourth Danny Phantom fanfic while I'm writing ToT.

You guys have been awesome! See you in the Fall!

-Velkan The Impaler  
Saturday, June 10, 2006, 12:54 p.m. eastern time


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